The Spike or Victoria University College Review
Sic Transit
Sic Transit
[It is proposed by the Defence Department to abolish kilts from the Highland Regiments.]
Ye men of Scotland! sons of a nation whose glories
Are known of the winds and the waters, thy splendour shall fade
Like the gold of the leaves in the autumn. Thy glory of yore is
All gone, I'm afraid.
The sun of thy splendour is sinking. Thy sons from afar
Are crying regret for the days that are past, and the lilts
That of old time were sung at the death of the men from the north are
Now sung to their kilts!
At the end of the earth they've abolished the kilt; and the tartan
Has been thrown to the rag-picker Time, so thy nation has now
Set its foot on the path that was trod by the Greek and the Spartan,
Which was downward, I trow.
No more shall the wail of the pibroch be heard o'er the charge in
The din and the rush of the fight, and the clansman who seeks
For the sounds that of yore stirred his blood, seeks in vain. Just imagine
A piper in breeks!
J. P. Lindsay.