The Arab Orange Lodge - by Crawford Howard (again)

Thought I should also post this, believed to also have been written by Crawford Howard, the author of The Diagonal Steam Trap:


A loyal band of Orangemen from Ulster's lovely land,
They could not march upon the 12th - processions was all banned,
So they flew off till the Middle East this dreadful law to dodge
And they founded in Jerusalem the Arab Orange Lodge

Big Ali Bey who charmed the snakes he was the first recruit,
John James McKeag from Portglenone learned him till play the flute
And as the oul' Pied Piper was once followed by the rats
There followed Ali till the lodge ten snakes in bowler hats.

They made a martial picture as they marched along the shore.
It stirred the blood when Ali played "The fez my father wore"
And Yussef Ben Mohammed hit the "lambeg" such a bash
It scared the living daylights from a Camel in a sash!

Now the movement spread both far and wide - there were lodges by the score.
The "Jerusalem Purple Heroes" was the first of many more,
The "Loyal Sons of Djeddah" and the "Mecca Purple Star"
And the "Rising Sons of Jericho" who came by motor car".

The banners too were wonderful and some would make you smile
King Billy on his camel as he splashed across the Nile -
But the Tyre and Sidon Temperance had the best one of them all
For they had a lovely picture of Damascus Orange Hall!

The Apprentice boys of Amman marched beneath the blazing sun,
The Royal Black Preceptory were negroes every one
And lodges came from Egypt, from the Abu Simbel Falls,
And they shouted "No Surrender!" and We'll guard old Cairo's walls!"

But when the ban was lifted and the lodges marched at last
The Arabs all decided for till march right through Belfast
And they caused a lot of trouble before they got afloat,
For they could not get the camels on the Belfast-Heysham boat!

Now camels choked up Liverpool and camels blocked Stranaer
And the Sheik of Kuwait came along in his great big motor car,
But the "Eastern Magic" L.O.L. they worked a crafty move.
They got on their magic carpets and flew into Aldergrove!

When they came to Castle Junction where once stood the wee Kiosk
They dug up Royal Avenue to build a flamin' mosque
And Devlin says to Gerry Fitt, "I think we'd better go!
"There's half a million camels coming down from Sandy Row.

The speeches at the "field" that day were really something new,
For some were made in Arabic and some were in Hebrew,
But just as Colonel Nasser had got up to sing "The Queen",
I woke up in my bed at home and found it was a dream!