Page:Departmental Ditties and Ballads and Barrack-Room Ballads, Kipling, 1899.djvu/18

4 Ere they hewed the Sphinx's visage

Favouritism governed kissage,

Even as it does in this age.

Who shall doubt the secret hid

Under Cheops' pyramid

Was that the contractor did

Cheops out of several millions?

Or that Joseph's sudden rise

To Comptroller of Supplies

Was a fraud of monstrous size

On King Pharaoh's swart Civilian?

Thus, the artless songs I sing

Do not deal with anything

New or never said before.

As it was in the beginning

Is to-day official sinning,

And shall be for evermore.