The Animals in War Memorial
The Hurlingham Polo Association requested all Clubs or Members to donate towards this worthy cause which is on Park Lane, London. Many thousands of the casualties in the war were conscripted polo ponies and it was felt it would be a fitting endowment. HPC was the only Polo Club as a whole and who raised the largest donation within the total, something we were very proud of at the time.
THE PONIES PLEA By Archangel
We were galloping free on the tundra; our bellies were full and round; When your weapons were hewn from sharpened flints, And your knuckles near scraped the ground. When you clothed yourselves in pelts and you painted your bodies blue, And fed yourselves on the carrion meat, the way that scavengers do!
But we give to mankind all credit, other animals cannot compare; For you formed your tribes and learned to fight, And you bred like a mad march hare.
You mastered the fire from heaven; you built your boats with skill; But nature endowed you with other traits, to hunt and to fight and to kill.
You plundered the kingdom of nature; you took for your needs the best; You bridled and burdened the beasts for your use, Then hunted and fed off the rest!
You captured and broke our foals, branded and broken and scarred; You forced cold steel in their tender mouths, imprisoned them in a yard.
You’re a cruel and ignorant master, what you cannot control, you fear! You whip us and spur us and then wonder why, We kick and we bite and we rear.
You dominate all that you see; you bully and boast and beat; But we’re not like a cat that will fawn for its food, or a dog that will cringe at your feet.
You have shipped us over the seas, to death in far-off lands. You mounted your armies upon our backs, in the hills and the desert sands. We have done as we have been asked, And we’ve always done it well;
We carried those men of The Light Brigade into that mouth of hell!
We have given our heart and our soul, our stamina, strength and our speed. We’ve laid down our lives to defend your cause, But now it’s man’s help that we need.
For our place in the world has now changed, in all of the civilized lands; Our numbers are dwindling; you need us no more; Life places our fate in your hands!
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