Hysterical News Agency’s Sirus D Clover reports from Uzbekistan:
The Charge of The Light Brigade might’ve been a whole lot different had Florence Nightingale turned her energies to parking restriction enforcement and descended, with her army of clampers, upon the 4th and 13th Light Dragoons, the 17th Lancers and the 8th and 11th Hussars with her lamp and wooden clamps under the veil of darkness, the History Maintenance Commission has revealed. The extortionate charge levied by them would have given new meaning to The Charge of the Light Brigade and impacted upon Lord Tennyson’s famous poem.
The Revised Charge of the Light Brigade by Alfred, Lord Tennyson.
1
Half a log, half a log,
Half a log longward,
All in the valley of Wealth
To immobilise the six hundred.
“Forward, the Light Brigade!
“Charge extra for the guns!” she said:
Into the Valley of Wealth
To immobilise the six hundred.
2
“Forward, the Light Brigade!”
Six hundred men dismay’d?
Reluctantly, the victims knew
Florence had plunder’d
Theirs not to make reply,
Theirs not to reason why,
Theirs but to shackle apply:
Into the Valley of Wealth
To immobilise the six hundred.
3
Cannon to right of them,
Cannon to left of them,
Cannon in front of them
To shackle and thus plunder:
Storm’d at with clamp and nail
Under the darkness veil,
Into the jaws of Death,
Into the mouth of Hell
Fell the six hundred.
4
Flash’d all their backsides bare,
Flash’d as blue turned the air,
Sobering the gunners there,
Charging a noble army, while
All the world she plunder’d:
Plung’d into the battery as they smoked
Right thro’ soldiers’ hearts she broke;
But not Cossack and Russian.
Reel’d from the Mistress Stroke
Shatter’d and sunder’d.
Then they stood back,
Having ensnared the six hundred.
5
Cannon to right of them,
Cannon to left of them,
Cannon behind them
All shackl’d and thus plunder’d;
Stormed at with clamp and nail,
While horse and hero dwell,
They fought so well
View the jaws of Death,
Grasped by the mouths of Hell,
That was all that was left for them,
Left for the six hundred.
6
When can their glory fade?
O the wild charge they made!
All the world wondered.
Honour the charge they made,
Honour the Light Brigade,
The Nobled six hundred.
P.S. from Alfred, Lord Tennyson to agent. I wonder’d if you can get me more letter E’s. I’m getting piss’d off having to use apostrophes.
Categories: Florence Nightingale