A Thousand Dead

Christopher Hitchens, whom I like and respect more and more as I read his stories, quotes Bernard Spencer on the meaning of 1,000 dead. While it is unclear exactly to what context Spencer referred, Hitchens obviously has Iraq in mind:

I read of a thousand killed.
And am glad because the scrounging imperial paw
Was there so bitten:
As a man at elections is thrilled
When the results pour in, and the North goes with him
And the West breaks in the thaw.

(That fighting was a long way off.)

Forgetting therefore an election
Being fought with votes and lies and catch-cries
And orator's frowns and flowers and posters' noise
Is paid for with cheques and toys:
Wars the most glorious
Victory-winged and steeple-uproarious
... With the lives, burned-off,
Of young men and boys.

Hitchens points out that there is no magic in the number 1,000: in reality, 999 or 1,001 is just as appalling. Something about round numbers makes one stop and think, however.