The Colonel and the Memsab

Just a few lines of amusement

 

As they sat on the veranda of the Hotel Exotic

Drinking the old G & T

Between reminiscing their lifelong romance

And the occasional hot pot of Tea

Old Colonel Maguire, of the old Forty-Fifth

The regiment now long disbanded

To listen to his tales of gallantry and battles fought

You would have thought he had beaten the Fuzzy-Wuzzies, single handed

During their time in the Sudan, under Kitchener I believe

Leading his regiment into battle almost daily

But Mrs Maguire, now well past her prime

Just smiled a lot and ranted quite gaily

As they talked about things from so long ago

When he was a dashing lieutenant, so daring and brave

And she looked so radiant in her best Sunday dress

In those days men knew how to behave

An officer and a gentleman was the order of the day

No bad language, not a hair out of place

The Memsab in turn, at his side everywhere

Travelled along at her own steady pace

When a dashing young officer, named Captain O’Rourke

Took a fancy to the Memsab, so elegant and beautiful she did look

Fisticuffs ensued the night at the Kings welcoming ball

The like, of which you only find written a book

 

 

A few raised words of the jealous kind

And a slap with a glove, accompanied with the threat of a duel

As things get mightily out of hand

With the Memsab lighting the fuel

The Colonel and O’Rourke squaring up on the lawn

Like two prize-fighters ready to do battle

For them nothing unseemly as pistols at dawn

No sound of a flashing Sabre’s rattle

The Memsab, just watched, smiled and then turned away

Leaving the Colonel to do what he thought was his duty

To defend his wife’s honour, good name and all

Against a Captain who had got a bit fruity

After a few punches, and blood running noses

No Pistols or Swords anywhere in sight

Te altercation was quickly dispersed

And everyone disappeared in to the night

Such was life in the old Regiment

Everyone was upright and true

The old colonel with his stiff upper lip

Whose language frequently turned the air, blue?

But the Memsab, still as pretty as she was in her youth

Her tight dress still caught the men’s eyes

But by now age was catching her up

Along with the heat and the flies

But still together, and in love, as they had always been

Holding hands by the light of the moon

With still a spark in their eyes, or was it a sty

Who knows, it’s hard to tell in the dark evening gloom