THE POWER BEHIND
Austria (at the ultimatum stage): "I don't quite like his attitude. Somebody must be backing him."
On the Eve
MUTUAL SERVICE
Britannia (to Peace): "I've been doing my best for you in Europe. Please do your best for me in Ireland."
Punch was not wholly blind to the peril of Serbia. In his second cartoon, "The Power Behind," we see the Austrian Eagle threatening the little Serbian bird and suspecting that someone must be backing him—the someone being the Russian Bear hidden behind a rock. The immediate situation was not misread, but Punch, in his own words, was in an "irrepressible holiday mood," and little thought that on the day on which his cartoon appeared Austria would declare war on Serbia. Yet even this warning did not bring home to Punch the imminence of the "Grand Smash." The makers of wars have no consideration for the producers of weekly papers. The issue, dated August 5, had gone to press before Germany declared war on Russia and France, and was published only a few hours before Great Britain was at war with Germany. The cartoon of the week shows Britannia appealing to Peace to do the best for her in Ireland, having done her best for Peace in Europe.[3] The "Essence of Parliament" is more concerned with gun-running at Clontarf than the prospect of a European convulsion, and the verses on the "Logic of Ententes: composed on what looks like the eve of a general European War," and intended to reflect the views of an average British patriot, are governed by the feeling that the whole thing is "an awful bore." Britons "never can be Slavs," and the last couplet runs thus:—
"Well, if I must, I shall have to fight
For the love of a bounding Balkanite."
An even more detached and ironical note is sounded in the fantasy headed "Armageddon"—a satire on Porkins, a blatant young golfing "nut" who thinks that England needs a war to cure her of flabbiness. The granting of his desire is traced to the cynical intervention of the Gods of Olympus in promoting a little scrap over a love affair in an obscure corner of the Balkans:—