Pity you've broken all the rules, for this'll Spoil WOODROW'S programme when at last, Not having checked those breaches with his whistle, He wants to blow the final blast; Time will be called, I fancy, when the score Suits us, and not before.
(_The KING OF THE HELLENES and the KAISER: On the Telephone_).
_The King._ HALLOA! Are you there? Halloa, halloa! Are you there, I say?
_The Kaiser._ All right, all right. Who's talking?
_The King._ KING CONSTANTINE. I want a word with the KAISER.
_The Kaiser._ Ha, TINO, it's you, is it? Fire away.
_The Kaiser._ Yes; what do you want? I haven't too much time.
_The King._ I say, the most awful thing has happened. The Allies have sent me an Ultimatum.
_The Kaiser._ I say, old man, you really must speak louder and more plainly. I can't hear a word you say.
_The King._ The Allies have sent me an ULTIMATUM!! Did you hear that time?
_The Kaiser._ Not very much. Lots of other people have had ultimatums and haven't been one pfennig the worse for them.
_The King._ Oh, but this is the very last thing in ultimatums. It's a regular ultimatissimum.
_The Kaiser._ What do they want you to do?
_The King._ All sorts of disagreeable things. For instance, I am to move my troops to the Peloponnese, so as to get them out of harm's way.
_The Kaiser._ Well, move them. What are troops for except to be moved about? You can always move them back again, you know. I keep on moving troops forward and backward all the time. It's a mere nothing when you once get accustomed to it. Just you try it and see. Anything more?
_The King._ Yes; I'm to release from prison the followers of the pestilential VENIZELOS.
_The Kaiser._ That's unpleasant, of course, for a patent Greek War-Lord; but I should do it if I were you, and then you can let me know how it feels.
_The King._ Look here, William, I don't know what's the matter with you, but I wish you wouldn't try to be so funny. You seem to think the whole affair's a sort of German joke. So it is, by Zeus--that's to say it's no joke at all.
_The King._ I'm sick and tired of all this talk.
_The Kaiser._ If you go on like that I shall not talk to you any more.
_The King._ Don't say that; I could not bear such a loss. But, seriously, are you going to help as you promised?