An Alphabet of History

An Alphabet of History
Words by Wilbur D. Nesbit
Pictures by Ellsworth Young

ALEXANDER THE GREAT

Alexander in full armour.
Alexander the Great was a victim of fate,
And he sighed there was naught to delight him
When he brandished his sword and defiantly roared
And could not get a country to fight him.

All the armies he'd chased, all the lands laid to waste,
And he clamored for further diversions;
And our history speaks of his grip on the Greeks
And his hammerlock hold on the Persians.

Though the Gordian knot, cut in two, in a spot
In his palace was labeled a relic,
Though Bucephalus, stuffed, gave him fame, he was huffed—
He was grouchy and grumpy, was Aleck.

And the cause of his woe, he would have you to know,
Was the fact that he never was able
To conduct a big scrap that a versatile chap
Of a war correspondent would cable.