The Ferocious Bellicose Party
Mynheer van Ploomp, Frau van Ploomp, and Fräulein van Ploomp sitting censoriously on the newspaper, may be raging for their country to come into the war, but they certainly don’t look like it.
One can never judge, of course, by outside appearances, but the casual observer might reasonably infer from the surface look of things that Mynheer had not done so very badly by keeping out of the scrap.
As “Patriot”—“Nederlander,” etc., he may write ferocious epistles to the papers demanding a firm stand by his country on the side of right. But the compression of his left optic belies the supposition.
Mynheer’s “neutrality” has very comfortably lined his own nest and his own inside. And yet he knows—none better that, should the tiger take it into his head, he would be gobbled up at a mouthful. Knows moreover that, if by any fatal chance the tiger won the game, he would inevitably be the next morsel to be gobbled.
When Germany is at last on the run, the ferocious bellicose party will probably come in on the side of the winners. It is not a lofty game. But it probably pays.
JOHN OXENHAM
ONE OF THE FEROCIOUS BELLICOSE PARTY
There existed a considerable party in Holland who were held up to derision for wishing their country to come into the war.