Imperialism! (1909)

From the February 1909 issue of the Socialist Standard

When a certain Imperialist was dead, his friends, who had forgotten all about him when he was starving, thought his great love of the Empire should be fittingly memorialised, so they clubbed together to raise upon his grave a chaste headstone, upon which was inscribed the following beautiful legend:—

HERE LIE

the mortal remains of

JOHN SMITH,

who worked hard and died poor, supported

through all the trials and vicissitudes of life by

THE REFLECTION

that 

HE WAS THE PROUD INHERITOR

of a share

IN THE GLORIOUS EMPIRE UPON 

WHICH THE SUN NEVER SETS.

At his death 

he was placed in this grave,

and his share of 

THE GLORIOUS EMPIRE

was 

reverently shovelled in on top of him,

so that he

came by his own in

THE END.

—Stockton Bulletin