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And prey on your country’s defenders
Instead of her foes?

Are you really French vermin, I wonder,
Or when the new trenches were won
Did they count in the tale of their plunder
The fleas and the lice of the Hun?
Do no thoughts of my vengeance appal you
When at night to the battle you rise,
Are you patriots, or shall I call you
Mere traitors and spies?

Nay, then I shall slay you, preferring
To think you the breed of the Bosche,
Who leap from your trenches preparing
To feed on the vitals of Tosh.[1]
When the iron of the tailor is singeing
The pleats of the kilt that was mine,
I like to think you will die singing
The Watch on the Rhine.

  1. Name by which I was known in the battalion.
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