human
Can you write a poem for me in the style of Mark Twain?
assistant
Sure, here's a poem in the style of Mark Twain:
  The Post that Fitted
The Rubaiyat of Omar Kal'vin
The Mare's Nest
Ballad of Fisher's Boarding-House
The Undertaker's Horse
The Ballad of the King's Mercy
The Ballad of the King's Jest
At the Pit's Mouth
A Second-rate Woman
Miss Youghal's Sais
Cupid's Arrows
The Conversion of Aurellan McGoggin
A Germ-destroyer
The Broken-link Handicap
The Bronckhorst Divorce-case
A Friend's Friend
I have eaten your bread and salt,
I have drunk your water and wine,
The deaths ye died I have watched beside,
And the lives that ye led were mine.
Was there aught that I did not share
In vigil or toil or ease,
One joy or woe that I did not know,
Dear hearts across the seas?
I have written the tale of our life
For a sheltered people's mirth,
In jesting guise--but ye are wise,
And ye know what the jest is worth.
We are very slightly changed
From the semi-apes who ranged
India's prehistoric clay;
Whoso drew the longest bow,
Ran his brother down, you know,
As we run men down today.
"Dowb," the first of all his race,
Met the Mammoth face to face
On the lake or in the cave,
Stole the steadiest canoe,
Ate the quarry others slew,
Died--and took the finest grave.
When they scratched the reindeer-bone
Someone made the sketch his own,
Filched it from the artist--then,
Even in those early days,
Won a simple Viceroy's praise
Through the toil of other men.
Ere they hewed the Sphinx's visage
Favoritism governed kissage,
Even as it does in this age.
Who shall doubt the secret hid
Under Cheops' pyramid
Was that the contractor did
Cheops out of several millions?
Or that Joseph's sudden rise
Was a fraud of monstrous size
On King Pharoah's swart Civilians?
Thus, the artless songs I sing
Do not deal with anything
New or never said before.
As it was in the beginning,
Is today official sinning,
And shall be forevermore.
Old is the song that I sing--
Old as my unpaid bills--
Old as the chicken that kitmutgars bring
Men at dak-bungalows--old as the Hills.
Was dowered with a tenor voice of super-Santley tone.
His views on equitation were, perhaps, a trifle queer;
He had no seat worth mentioning, but oh! he had an ear.
He clubbed his wretched company a dozen times a day,
He used to quit his charger in a parabolic way,
His method of saluting was the joy of all beholders,
But Ahasuerus Jenkins had a head upon his shoulders.
He took two months to Simla when the year was at the spring,
And underneath the deodars eternally did sing.
He warbled like a bulbul, but particularly at
Cornelia Agrippina who was musical and fat.
From April to October on a plump retaining fee,
Supplied, of course, per mensem, by the Indian Treasury.
Cornelia used to sing with him, and Jenkins used to play;
He praised unblushingly her notes, for he was false as they:
So when the winds of April turned the budding roses brown,
Cornelia told her husband: "Tom, you mustn't send him down."
They haled him from his regiment which didn't much regret him;
And draw his plump retaining fee--which means his double pay.
Now, ever after dinner, when the coffeecups are brought,
Ahasuerus waileth o'er the grand pianoforte;
And, thanks to fair Cornelia, his fame hath waxen great,
And Ahasuerus Jenkins is a power in the State.
This ditty is a string of lies.
But--how the deuce did Gubbins rise?
Stands at the top of the tree;
And I muse in my bed on the reasons that led
To the hoisting of Potiphar G.
Is seven years junior to Me;
Each bridge that he makes he either buckles or breaks,
And his work is as rough as he.
Is coarse as a chimpanzee;
And I can't understand why you gave him your hand,
Is dear to the Powers that Be;
For They bow and They smile in an affable style
Which is seldom accorded to Me.
Is certain as certain can be
Of a highly-paid post which is claimed by a host
Of seniors--including Me.
Careless and lazy is he,
Greatly inferior to Me.
What is the spell that you manage so well,
Let me inquire of thee,
Should I have riz to what Potiphar is,
Hadst thou been mated to me?
This is the reason why Rustum Beg,
Drinketh the "simpkin" and brandy peg,
Maketh the money to fly,
Vexeth a Government, tender and kind,
Also--but this is a detail--blind.
RUSTUM BEG of Kolazai--slightly backward native state
Lusted for a C. S. I.,--so began to sanitate.
Built a Jail and Hospital--nearly built a City drain--
Strange departures made he then--yea, Departments stranger still,
Talked of noble aims and high, hinted of a future fine
For the state of Kolazai, on a strictly Western line.
Rajah Rustum held his peace; lowered octroi dues a half;
Organized a State Police; purified the. Civil Staff;
Settled cess and tax afresh in a very liberal way;
Cut temptations of the flesh--also cut the Bukhshi's pay;
Roused his Secretariat to a fine Mahratta fury,
By a Hookum hinting at supervision of dasturi;
Turned the State of Kolazai very nearly upside-down;
When the end of May was nigh, waited his achievement crown.
When the Birthday Honors came,
Sad to state and sad to see,
Stood against the Rajah's name nothing more than C. I. E.!
Things were lively for a week in the State of Kolazai.
Even now the people speak of that time regretfully.
How he disendowed the Jail--stopped at once the City drain;
Turned to beauty fair and frail--got his senses back again;
Doubled taxes, cesses, all; cleared away each new-built thana;
Turned the two-lakh Hospital into a superb Zenana;
Heaped upon the Bukhshi Sahib wealth and honors manifold;
Clad himself in Eastern garb--squeezed his people as of old.
Happy, happy Kolazai!  Never more  will Rustum Beg
Play to catch the Viceroy's eye. He prefers the "simpkin" peg.
"Now there were two men in one city;
the one rich and the other poor."
Jack Barrett went to Quetta
Because they told him to.
He left his wife at Simla
On three-fourths his monthly screw:
Jack Barrett died at Quetta
Ere the next month's pay he drew.
Jack Barrett went to Quetta.
He didn't understand
The reason of his transfer
From the pleasant mountain-land:
The season was September,
And it killed him out of hand.
Jack Barrett went to Quetta,
And there gave up the ghost,
Attempting two men's duty
In that very healthy post;
And Mrs. Barrett mourned for him
Five lively months at most.
Jack Barrett's bones at Quetta
Enjoy profound repose;
But I shouldn't be astonished
If now his spirit knows
The reason of his transfer
From the Himalayan snows.
And, when the Last Great Bugle Call
Adown the Hurnal throbs,
When the last grim joke is entered
In the big black Book of Jobs,
And Quetta graveyards give again
Their victims to the air,
I shouldn't like to be the man
Who sent Jack Barrett there.
Though tangled and twisted the course of true love
This ditty explains,
No tangle's so tangled it cannot improve
If the Lover has brains.
Ere the steamer bore him Eastward, Sleary was engaged to marry
Sleary's pay was very modest; Sleary was the other way.
Who can cook a two-plate dinner on eight poor rupees a day?
Certainly an impecunious Subaltern was not a catch,
But the Boffkins knew that Minnie mightn't make another match.
Anyhow, the billet carried pay enough for him to marry--
Did he, therefore, jilt Miss Boffkin--impulse of a baser mind?
No! He started epileptic fits of an appalling kind.
Frequently in public places his affliction used to smite
Sleary with distressing vigour--always in the Boffkins' sight.
Ere a week was over Minnie weepingly returned his ring,
Told him his "unhappy weakness" stopped all thought of marrying.
Sleary bore the information with a chastened holy joy,--
Epileptic fits don't matter in Political employ,--
Year by year, in pious patience, vengeful Mrs. Boffkin sits
Waiting for the Sleary babies to develop Sleary's fits.
Walpole talks of "a man and his price."
List to a ditty queer--
The sale of a Deputy-Acting-Vice-
Bought like a bullock, hoof and hide,
By the Laws of the Family Circle 'tis written in letters of brass
Now Exeter Battleby Tring had laboured from boyhood to eld
Black as the raven his garb, and his heresies jettier still--
Hinting that Railways required lifetimes of study and knowledge--
Wherefore the Little Tin Gods harried their little tin souls,
Seeing he came not from Chatham, jingled no spurs at his heels,
Knowing that, nevertheless, was he first on the Government rolls
Letters not seldom they wrote him, "having the honour to state,"
It would be better for all men if he were laid on the shelf.
Much would accrue to his bank-book, an he consented to wait
Until the Little Tin Gods built him a berth for himself,
Thus did the Little Tin Gods (long may Their Highnesses thrive!)
Silence his mouth with rupees, keeping their Circle intact;
We have another viceroy now,--those days are dead and done
Of Delilah Aberyswith and depraved Ulysses Gunne.
Delilah Aberyswith was a lady--not too young--
With a perfect taste in dresses and a badly-bitted tongue,
With a thirst for information, and a greater thirst for praise,
And a little house in Simla in the Prehistoric Days.
By reason of her marriage to a gentleman in power,
Delilah was acquainted with the gossip of the hour;
And many little secrets, of the half-official kind,
Were whispered to Delilah, and she bore them all in mind.
She patronized extensively a man, Ulysses Gunne,
Whose mode of earning money was a low and shameful one.
He wrote for certain papers, which, as everybody knows,
Is worse than serving in a shop or scaring off the crows.
He praised her "queenly beauty" first; and, later on, he hinted
At the "vastness of her intellect" with compliment unstinted.
He went with her a-riding, and his love for her was such
That he lent her all his horses and--she galled them very much.
One day, THEY brewed a secret of a fine financial sort;
It related to Appointments, to a Man and a Report.
'Twas almost worth the keeping,--only seven people knew it--
And Gunne rose up to seek the truth and patiently pursue it.
It was a Viceroy's Secret, but--perhaps the wine was red--
Perhaps an Aged Councillor had lost his aged head--
Perhaps Delilah's eyes were bright--Delilah's whispers sweet--
The Aged Member told her what 'twere treason to repeat.
Ulysses went a-riding, and they talked of love and flowers;
Ulysses went a-calling, and he called for several hours;
Ulysses went a-waltzing, and Delilah helped him dance--
Ulysses let the waltzes go, and waited for his chance.
The summer sun was setting, and the summer air was still,
The couple went a-walking in the shade of Summer Hill.
The wasteful sunset faded out in Turkish-green and gold,
Ulysses pleaded softly, and-- that bad Delilah told!
Next morn, a startled Empire learnt the all-important news;
Next week, the Aged Councillor was shaking in his shoes.
Next month, I met Delilah and she did not show the least
Hesitation in affirming that Ulysses was a "beast."
We have another Viceroy now, those days are dead and done--
Of Delilah Aberyswith and most mean Ulysses Gunne!
Hurree Chunder Mookerjee, pride of Bow Bazaar,
Owner of a native press, "Barrishter-at-Lar,"
Waited on the Government with a claim to wear
Sabres by the bucketful, rifles by the pair.
Then the Indian Government winked a wicked wink,
Said to Chunder Mookerjee: "Stick to pen and ink.
They are safer implements, but, if you insist,
We will let you carry arms wheresoe'er you list."
Hurree Chunder Mookerjee sought the gunsmith and
Bought the tubes of Lancaster, Ballard, Dean, and Bland,
Bought a shiny bowie-knife, bought a town-made sword,
Jingled like a carriage-horse when he went abroad.
But the Indian Government, always keen to please,
Also gave permission to horrid men like these--
Yar Mahommed Yusufzai, down to kill or steal,
Chimbu Singh from Bikaneer, Tantia the Bhil;
Killar Khan the Marri chief, Jowar Singh the Sikh,
He was a Wahabi; last, little Boh Hla-oo
Took advantage of the Act--took a Snider too.
They were unenlightened men, Ballard knew them not.
They procured their swords and guns chiefly on the spot;
And the lore of centuries, plus a hundred fights,
Made them slow to disregard one another's rights.
With a unanimity dear to patriot hearts
All those hairy gentlemen out of foreign parts
Said: "The good old days are back--let us go to war!"
Swaggered down the Grand Trunk Road into Bow Bazaar,
Nubbee Baksh Punjabi Jat found a hide-bound flail;
Chimbu Singh from Bikaneer oiled his Tonk jezail;
Yar Mahommed Yusufzai spat and grinned with glee
As he ground the butcher-knife of the Khyberee.
Jowar Singh the Sikh procured sabre, quoit, and mace,
Abdul Huq, Wahabi, jerked his dagger from its place,
While amid the jungle-grass danced and grinned and jabbered
Little Boh Hla-oo and cleared his dah-blade from the scabbard.
What became of Mookerjee? Soothly, who can say?
Yar Mahommed only grins in a nasty way,
Jowar Singh is reticent, Chimbu Singh is mute.
But the belts of all of them simply bulge with loot.
What became of Ballard's guns? Afghans black and grubby
Sell them for their silver weight to the men of Pubbi;
And the shiny bowie-knife and the town-made sword are
Hanging in a Marri camp just across the Border.
What became of Mookerjee? Ask Mahommed Yar
Prodding Siva's sacred bull down the Bow Bazaar.
Speak to placid Nubbee Baksh--question land and sea--
Ask the Indian Congressmen--only don't ask me!
They are fools who kiss and tell"--
Wisely has the poet sung.
Man may hold all sorts of posts
If he'll only hold his tongue.
Jenny and Me were engaged, you see,
So a kiss or two was nothing to you
Or any one else at all.
Jenny would go in a domino--
Pretty and pink but warm;
While I attended, clad in a splendid
Austrian uniform.
Now we had arranged, through notes exchanged
Early that afternoon,
At Number Four to waltz no more,
But to sit in the dusk and spoon.
I wish you to see that Jenny and Me
Had barely exchanged our troth;
So a kiss or two was strictly due
By, from, and between us both.
When Three was over, an eager lover,
I fled to the gloom outside;
And a Domino came out also
Whom I took for my future bride.
That is to say, in a casual way,
I slipped my arm around her;
With a kiss or two (which is nothing to you),
And ready to kiss I found her.
She turned her head and the name she said
Was certainly not my own;
But ere I could speak, with a smothered shriek
She fled and left me alone.
Then Jenny came, and I saw with shame
She'd doffed her domino;
And I had embraced an alien waist--
But I did not tell her so.
Next morn I knew that there were two
Dominoes pink, and one
Had cloaked the spouse of Sir Julian House,
Our big Political gun.
Sir J. was old, and her hair was gold,
And her eye was a blue cerulean;
And the name she said when she turned her head
Was not in the least like "Julian."
Shun--shun the Bowl! That fatal, facile drink
Has ruined many geese who dipped their quills in 't;
Bribe, murder, marry, but steer clear of Ink
Save when you write receipts for paid-up bills in 't.
There may be silver in the "blue-black"--all
I know of is the iron and the gall.
Boanerges Blitzen, servant of the Queen,
Is a dismal failure--is a Might-have-been.
In a luckless moment he discovered men
Rise to high position through a ready pen.
Boanerges Blitzen argued therefore--"I,
With the selfsame weapon, can attain as high."
Only he did not possess when he made the trial,
Wicked wit of C-lv-n, irony of L--l.
Something more than ordinary journalistic prose.]
Never young Civilian's prospects were so bright,
Till an Indian paper found that he could write:
Never young Civilian's prospects were so dark,
When the wretched Blitzen wrote to make his mark.
Certainly he scored it, bold, and black, and firm,
In that Indian paper--made his seniors squirm,
Quoted office scandals, wrote the tactless truth--
Was there ever known a more misguided youth?
When the Rag he wrote for praised his plucky game,
Boanerges Blitzen felt that this was Fame;
When the men he wrote of shook their heads and swore,
Boanerges Blitzen only wrote the more:
Posed as Young Ithuriel, resolute and grim,
Till he found promotion didn't come to him;
Till he found that reprimands weekly were his lot,
And his many Districts curiously hot.
Till he found his furlough strangely hard to win,
Boanerges Blitzen didn't care to pin:
Then it seemed to dawn on him something wasn't right--
Boanerges Blitzen put it down to "spite";
Languished in a District desolate and dry;
Watched the Local Government yearly pass him by;
Wondered where the hitch was; called it most unfair.
That was seven years ago--and he still is there!
"Why is my District death-rate low?"
"Well, drains, and sewage-outfalls are
"My own peculiar fad.
"I learnt a lesson once, It ran
"Thus," quoth that most veracious man:--
It was an August evening and, in snowy garments clad,
I paid a round of visits in the lines of Hezabad;
When, presently, my Waler saw, and did not like at all,
A Commissariat elephant careering down the Mall.
I couldn't see the driver, and across my mind it rushed
That that Commissariat elephant had suddenly gone musth.
I didn't care to meet him, and I couldn't well get down,
So I let the Waler have it, and we headed for the town.
Till the Waler jumped a bullock just above the City Drain;
And the next that I remember was a hurricane of squeals,
And the creature making toothpicks of my five-foot patent wheels.
He seemed to want the owner, so I fled, distraught with fear,
To the Main Drain sewage-outfall while he snorted in my ear--
Heard it trumpet on my shoulder--tried to crawl a little higher--
While the trunk was feeling blindly for a purchase on my toes!
It missed me by a fraction, but my hair was turning grey
Before they called the drivers up and dragged the brute away.
Then I sought the City Elders, and my words were very plain.
You may hold with surface-drainage, and the sun-for-garbage cure,
I believe in well-flushed culverts. . . .
This is why the death-rate's small;
And, if you don't believe me, get shikarred yourself. That's all.
Lest you should think this story true
I merely mention I
Evolved it lately. 'Tis a most
Unmitigated misstatement.
Now Jones had left his new-wed bride to keep his house in order,
And hied away to the Hurrum Hills above the Afghan border,
To sit on a rock with a heliograph; but ere he left he taught
His wife the working of the Code that sets the miles at naught.
And Love had made him very sage, as Nature made her fair;
So Cupid and Apollo linked , per heliograph, the pair.
At dawn, across the Hurrum Hills, he flashed her counsel wise--
At e'en, the dying sunset bore her husband's homilies.
He warned her 'gainst seductive youths in scarlet clad and gold,
As much as 'gainst the blandishments paternal of the old;
But kept his gravest warnings for (hereby the ditty hangs)
That snowy-haired Lothario, Lieutenant-General Bangs.
"Was ever General Officer addressed as 'dear' before?
The artless Aide-de-camp was mute; the gilded Staff were still,
But, howsoever Love be blind, the world at large hath eyes.]
With damnatory dot and dash he heliographed his wife
Some interesting details of the General's private life.
The artless Aide-de-camp was mute, the shining Staff were still,
And red and ever redder grew the General's shaven gill.
And this is what he said at last (his feelings matter not):--
All honour unto Bangs, for ne'er did Jones thereafter know
By word or act official who read off that helio.
But the tale is on the Frontier, and from Michni to Mooltan
They know the worthy General as "that most immoral man."
Twelve hundred million men are spread
About this Earth, and I and You
Wonder, when You and I are dead,
"What will those luckless millions do?"
None whole or clean, " we cry, "or free from stain
Of favour." Wait awhile, till we attain
The Last Department where nor fraud nor fools,
Nor grade nor greed, shall trouble us again.
Fear, Favour, or Affection--what are these
To the grim Head who claims our services?
I never knew a wife or interest yet
Delay that pukka step, miscalled "decease";
When leave, long overdue, none can deny;
When idleness of all Eternity
Becomes our furlough, and the marigold
Our thriftless, bullion-minting Treasury
Each in his strait, wood-scantled office pent,
No longer Brown reverses Smith's appeals,
Or Jones records his Minute of Dissent.
And One, long since a pillar of the Court,
As mud between the beams thereof is wrought;
And One who wrote on phosphates for the crops
Is subject-matter of his own Report.
These be the glorious ends whereto we pass--
Let Him who Is, go call on Him who Was;
And He shall see the mallie steals the slab
For currie-grinder, and for goats the grass.
A breath of wind, a Border bullet's flight,
A draught of water, or a horse's fright--
The droning of the fat Sheristadar
Ceases, the punkah stops, and falls the night
For you or Me. Do those who live decline
The step that offers, or their work resign?
Trust me, Today's Most Indispensables,
Five hundred men can take your place or mine.
God of our fathers, known of old--
Lord of our far-flung battle line--
Beneath whose awful hand we hold
Dominion over palm and pine--
Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,
Lest we forget--lest we forget!
The tumult and the shouting dies--
The Captains and the Kings depart--
Still stands Thine ancient sacrifice,
An humble and a contrite heart.
Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,
Lest we forget--lest we forget!
Far-called our navies melt away--
On dune and headland sinks the fire--
Lo, all our pomp of yesterday
Is one with Nineveh and Tyre!
Judge of the Nations, spare us yet,
Lest we forget--lest we forget!
If, drunk with sight of power, we loose
Wild tongues that have not Thee in awe--
Such boastings as the Gentiles use,
Or lesser breeds without the Law--
Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,
Lest we forget--lest we forget!
For heathen heart that puts her trust
In reeking tube and iron shard--
All valiant dust that builds on dust,
And guarding calls not Thee to guard.
For frantic boast and foolish word,
A fool there was and he made his prayer
To a rag and a bone and a hank of hair
(We called her the woman who did not care),
But the fool he called her his lady fair
Oh the years we waste and the tears we waste
And the work of our head and hand,
Belong to the woman who did not know
(And now we know that she never could know)
And did not understand.
A fool there was and his goods he spent
Honor and faith and a sure intent
But a fool must follow his natural bent
(And it wasn't the least what the lady meant),
Oh the toil we lost and the spoil we lost
And the excellent things we planned,
Belong to the woman who didn't know why
(And now we know she never knew why)
And did not understand.
The fool we stripped to his foolish hide
Which she might have seen when she threw him aside--
(But it isn't on record the lady tried)
So some of him lived but the most of him died--
And it isn't the shame and it isn't the blame
That stings like a white hot brand.
It's coming to know that she never knew why
(Seeing at last she could never know why)
And never could understand.
Now the New Year, reviving last Year's Debt,
The Thoughtful Fisher casteth wide his Net;
So I with begging Dish and ready Tongue
Assail all Men for all that I can get.
Imports indeed are gone with all their Dues--
Lo! Salt a Lever that I dare not use,
Surely my Kith and Kin will not refuse!
Pay--and I promise by the Dust of Spring,
Retrenchment.  If my promises can bring
Comfort, Ye have Them now a thousandfold--
By Allah! I will promise Anything!
Indeed, indeed, Retrenchment oft before
I swore--but did I mean it when I swore?
And then, and then, We wandered to the Hills,
And so the Little Less became Much More.
I know not how the wretched Thing is done,
The Items of Receipt grow surely small;
The Items of Expense mount one by one.
I cannot help it. What have I to do
Let Scribes spit Blood and Sulphur as they please,
Or Statesmen call me foolish--Heed not you.
Behold, I promise--Anything You will.
Behold, I greet you with an empty Till--
Ah! Fellow-Sinners, of your Charity
Seek not the Reason of the Dearth, but fill.
For if I sinned and fell, where lies the Gain
Of Knowledge? Would it ease you of your Pain
To know the tangled Threads of Revenue,
I ravel deeper in a hopeless Skein?
"Who hath not Prudence"--what was it I said,
Of Her who paints her Eyes and tires Her Head,
And gibes and mocks the People in the Street,
And fawns upon them for Her thriftless Bread?
Accursed is She of Eve's daughters--She
Hath cast off Prudence, and Her End shall be
Destruction . . . Brethren, of your Bounty
Some portion of your daily Bread to Me.
A much-discerning Public hold
The Singer generally sings
And prints and sells his past for gold.
Whatever I may here disclaim,
The very clever folk I sing to
Will most indubitably cling to
Their pet delusion, just the same.
I had seen, as the dawn was breaking
And I staggered to my rest,
Tari Devi softly shaking
From the Cart Road to the crest.
I had seen the spurs of Jakko
Heave and quiver, swell and sink.
Was it Earthquake or tobacco,
In the full, fresh fragrant morning
I observed a camel crawl,
Laws of gravitation scorning,
On the ceiling and the wall;
Then I watched a fender walking,
And I heard grey leeches sing,
And a red-hot monkey talking
Did not seem the proper thing.
Then a Creature, skinned and crimson,
Ran about the floor and cried,
And they said that I had the "jims" on,
And they dosed me with bromide,
And they locked me in my bedroom--
Though I said: "To give my head room
You had best unroof the house."
But my words were all unheeded,
Though I told the grave M.D.
That the treatment really needed
Was a dip in open sea
That was lapping just below me,
Smooth as silver, white as snow,
And it took three men to throw me
When I found I could not go.
Half the night I watched the Heavens
Fizz like '81 champagne--
Fly to sixes and to sevens,
Wheel and thunder back again;
And when all was peace and order
Save one planet nailed askew,
Much I wept because my warder
Would not let me set it true.
After frenzied hours of waiting,
Pealed an awful voice dictating
An interminable sum,
Changing to a tangle story--
"What she said you said I said"--
Till the Moon arose in glory,
And I found her . . . in my head;
Then a Face came, blind and weeping,
And It couldn't wipe its eyes,
And It muttered I was keeping
Back the moonlight from the skies;
So I patted it for pity,
But it whistled shrill with wrath,
And a huge black Devil City
Poured its peoples on my path.
So I fled with steps uncertain
On a thousand-year long race,
But the bellying of the curtain
Kept me always in one place;
While the tumult rose and maddened
To the roar of Earth on fire,
Ere it ebbed and sank and saddened
To a whisper tense as wire.
In tolerable stillness
Rose one little, little star,
And it chuckled at my illness,
And it mocked me from afar;
And its brethren came and eyed me,
Called the Universe to aid,
Till I lay, with naught to hide me,
Dun and saffron, robed and splendid,
Broke the solemn, pitying Day,
And I knew my pains were ended,
And I turned and tried to pray;
But my speech was shattered wholly,
And I wept as children weep.
Till the dawn-wind, softly, slowly,
Brought to burning eyelids sleep.
I go to concert, party, ball--
What profit is in these?
I sit alone against the wall
And strive to look at ease.
The incense that is mine by right
They burn before her shrine;
And that's because I'm seventeen
And She is forty-nine.
I cannot check my girlish blush,
My color comes and goes;
I redden to my finger-tips,
And sometimes to my nose.
But She is white where white should be,
And red where red should shine.
The blush that flies at seventeen
Is fixed at forty-nine.
I wish I had Her constant cheek;
I wish that I could sing
All sorts of funny little songs,
Not quite the proper thing.
I'm very gauche and very shy,
Her jokes aren't in my line;
And, worst of all, I'm seventeen
While She is forty-nine.
The young men come, the young men go
Each pink and white and neat,
She's older than their mothers, but
They grovel at Her feet.
They walk beside Her 'rickshaw wheels--
None ever walk by mine;
And that's because I'm seventeen
And She is forty-nine.
She rides with half a dozen men,
(She calls them "boys" and "mashers")
I trot along the Mall alone;
My prettiest frocks and sashes
Don't help to fill my programme-card,
And vainly I repine
Would I were forty-nine!
She calls me "darling," "pet," and "dear,"
And "sweet retiring maid."
I'm always at the back, I know,
She puts me in the shade.
She introduces me to men,
"Cast" lovers, I opine,
For sixty takes to seventeen,
Nineteen to forty-nine.
But even She must older grow
And end Her dancing days,
She can't go on forever so
At concerts, balls and plays.
One ray of priceless hope I see
Before my footsteps shine;
Just think, that She'll be eighty-one
When I am forty-nine.
Eyes of grey--a sodden quay,
Driving rain and falling tears,
As the steamer wears to sea
In a parting storm of cheers.
Sing, for Faith and Hope are high--
None so true as you and I--
"Love like ours can never die!"
Eyes of black--a throbbing keel,
Milky foam to left and right;
Whispered converse near the wheel
In the brilliant tropic night.
Cross that rules the Southern Sky!
Stars that sweep and wheel and fly,
Love like ours can never die!"
Eyes of brown--a dusty plain
Split and parched with heat of June,
Flying hoof and tightened rein,
Hearts that beat the old, old tune.
Side by side the horses fly,
Frame we now the old reply
"Love like ours can never die!"
Eyes of blue--the Simla Hills
Silvered with the moonlight hoar;
Pleading of the waltz that thrills,
Dies and echoes round Benmore.
Glamour, wine, and witchery--
On my soul's sincerity,
"Love like ours can never die!"
Maidens of your charity,
Pity my most luckless state.
Four times Cupid's debtor I--
Bankrupt in quadruplicate.
Yet, despite this evil case,
And a maiden showed me grace,
Four-and-forty times would I
"Love like ours can never die!"
("Saint @Proxed's ever was the Church for peace")
If down here I chance to die,
Solemnly I beg you take
All that is left of "I"
To the Hills for old sake's sake,
Pack me very thoroughly
In the ice that used to slake
Pegs I drank when I was dry--
This observe for old sake's sake.
To the railway station hie,
There a single ticket take
For Umballa--goods-train--I
Shall not mind delay or shake.
I shall rest contentedly
Spite of clamor coolies make;
Thus in state and dignity
Send me up for old sake's sake.
Next the sleepy Babu wake,
Book a Kalka van "for four."
Few, I think, will care to make
Journeys with me any more
As they used to do of yore.
I shall need a "special" break--
Thing I never took before--
Get me one for old sake's sake.
After that--arrangements make.
No hotel will take me in,
And a bullock's back would break
'Neath the teak and leaden skin
Tonga ropes are frail and thin,
Or, did I a back-seat take,
In a tonga I might spin,--
Do your best for old sake's sake.
After that--your work is done.
Recollect a Padre must
Mourn the dear departed one--
Throw the ashes and the dust.
Don't go down at once. I trust
You will find excuse to "snake
Three days' casual on the bust."
Get your fun for old sake's sake.
I could never stand the Plains.
Think of blazing June and May
Think of those September rains
Yearly till the Judgment Day!
I should never rest in peace,
I should sweat and lie awake.
Rail me then, on my decease,
To the Hills for old sake's sake.
It was an artless Bandar, and he danced upon a pine,
And much I wondered how he lived, and where the beast might dine,
I slept the sleep of idleness and dreamt that Bandar spoke.
He said: "O man of many clothes! Sad crawler on the Hills!
Observe, I know not Ranken's shop, nor Ranken's monthly bills;
I take no heed to trousers or the coats that you call dress;
Nor am I plagued with little cards for little drinks at Mess.
"I steal the bunnia's grain at morn, at noon and eventide,
(For he is fat and I am spare), I roam the mountain side,
I follow no man's carriage, and no, never in my life
Have I flirted at Peliti's with another Bandar's wife.
"O man of futile fopperies--unnecessary wraps;
I own no ponies in the hills, I drive no tall-wheeled traps;
I buy me not twelve-button gloves, 'short-sixes' eke, or rings,
Nor do I waste at Hamilton's my wealth on 'pretty things.'
"I quarrel with my wife at home, we never fight abroad;
But Mrs. B. has grasped the fact I am her only lord.
I never heard of fever--dumps nor debts depress my soul;
And I pity and despise you!" Here he poached my breakfast-roll.
His hide was very mangy, and his face was very red,
And ever and anon he scratched with energy his head.
His manners were not always nice, but how my spirit cried
To be an artless Bandar loose upon the mountain side!
So I answered: "Gentle Bandar, an inscrutable Decree
Makes thee a gleesome fleasome Thou, and me a wretched Me.
Go! Depart in peace, my brother, to thy home amid the pine;
Yet forget not once a mortal wished to change his lot for thine."
Scene.--The wooded heights of Simla. The Incarnation of
the Government of India in the raiment of the Angel of Plenty
sings, to pianoforte accompaniment:--
"How sweet is the shepherd's sweet life!
From the dawn to the even he strays--
And his tongue shall be filled with praise.
(adagio dim.) Filled with praise!"
(largendo con sp.) Now this is the position,
Go make an inquisition
Into their real condition
As swiftly as ye may.
(p) Ay, paint our swarthy billions
The richest of vermillions
Ere two well-led cotillions
Have danced themselves away.
Turkish Patrol, as able and intelligent Investigators wind
down the Himalayas:--
What is the state of the Nation? What is its occupation?
Hi! get along, get along, get along--lend us the information!
(dim.) Census the byle and the yabu--capture a first-class Babu,
Set him to file Gazetteers--Gazetteers . . .
(ff) What is the state of the Nation, etc., etc.
Interlude, from Nowhere in Particular, to stringed and Oriental
instruments.
Our cattle reel beneath the yoke they bear--
The earth is iron and the skies are brass--
And faint with fervour of the flaming air
The languid hours pass.
The well is dry beneath the village tree--
The young wheat withers ere it reach a span,
And belts of blinding sand show cruelly
Where once the river ran.
Pray, brothers, pray, but to no earthly King--
Lift up your hands above the blighted grain,
Look westward--if they please, the Gods shall bring
Their mercy with the rain.
Look westward--bears the blue no brown cloud-bank?
Nay, it is written--wherefore should we fly?
On our own field and by our cattle's flank
Lie down, lie down to die!
By the plumed heads of Kings
Waving high,
Where the tall corn springs
O'er the dead.
If they rust or rot we die,
If they ripen we are fed.
Very mighty is the power of our Kings!
Triumphal return to Simla of the Investigators, attired after
the manner of Dionysus, leading a pet tiger-cub in wreaths
of rhubarb-leaves, symbolical of India under medical treatment.
We have paid a particular visit to the affluent children of men.
Castanets and step-dance:--
Oh, the dom and the mag and the thakur and the thag,
And the nat and the brinjaree,
And the bunnia and the ryot are as happy and as quiet
And as plump as they can be!
Yes, the jain and the jat in his stucco-fronted hut,
And the bounding bazugar,
By the favour of the King, are as fat as anything,
They are--they are--they are!
How beautiful upon the Mountains--in peace reclining,
Thus to be assured that our people are unanimously dining.
(Cres.) How be-ewtiful upon the Mountains!
Hired Band,  brasses only, full chorus:--
God bless the Squire
And all his rich relations
Who teach us poor people
We eat our proper rations--
We eat our proper rations,
In spite of inundations,
Malarial exhalations,
And casual starvations,
We have, we have, they say we have--
We have our proper rations!
Before the beginning of years
There came to the rule of the State
Men with a pair of shears,
Men with an Estimate--
Strachey with Muir for leaven,
Lytton with locks that fell,
Ripon fooling with Heaven,
And Temple riding like H--ll!
And the bigots took in hand
Cess and the falling of rain,
And the measure of sifted sand
The dealer puts in the grain--
Imports by land and sea,
To uttermost decimal worth,
And registration--free--
In the houses of death and of birth.
And fashioned with pens and paper,
And fashioned in black and white,
With Life for a flickering taper
And Death for a blazing light--
That his strength might endure for a span--
From Adam's Bridge to Peshawur,
In the towns of the North and the East,
They gathered as unto rule,
They bade him starve his priest
And send his children to school.
Railways and roads they wrought,
For the needs of the soil within;
A time to squabble in court,
A time to bear and to grin.
And gave him peace in his ways,
Jails--and Police to fight,
Justice--at length of days,
And Right--and Might in the Right.
His speech is of mortgaged bedding,
On his kine he borrows yet,
At his heart is his daughter's wedding,
In his eye foreknowledge of debt.
He eats and hath indigestion,
He toils and he may not stop;
His life is a long-drawn question
Between a crop and a crop.
Was good beyond all earthly need;
But, on the other hand, her spouse
Was very, very bad indeed.
He smoked cigars, called churches slow,
And raced--but this she did not know.
For Belial Machiavelli kept
The little fact a secret, and,
Though o'er his minor sins she wept,
Jane Austen did not understand
That Lilly--thirteen-two and bay
Absorbed one-half her husband's pay.
She was so good, she made him worse;
(Some women are like this, I think;)
He taught her parrot how to curse,
Her Assam monkey how to drink.
He vexed her righteous soul until
She went up, and he went down hill.
Then came the crisis, strange to say,
Which turned a good wife to a better.
A telegraphic peon, one day,
Brought her--now, had it been a letter
Know Jane would just have let it lie.
But 'twas a telegram instead,
Marked "urgent," and her duty plain
To open it. Jane Austen read:
"Your Lilly's got a cough again.
Can't understand why she is kept
At your expense." Jane Austen wept.
It was a misdirected wire.
Her husband was at Shaitanpore.
She spread her anger, hot as fire,
Through six thin foreign sheets or more.
Sent off that letter, wrote another
To her solicitor--and mother.
Her error and, I trust, his own,
Wired to the minion of the Law,
And traveled wifeward--not alone.
For Lilly--thirteen-two and bay--
Came in a horse-box all the way.
There was a scene--a weep or two--
With many kisses. Austen Jane
Rode Lilly all the season through,
And never opened wires again.
She races now with Belial. This
Is very sad, but so it is.
Ay, lay him 'neath the Simla pine--
A fortnight fully to be missed,
Behold, we lose our fourth at whist,
A chair is vacant where we dine.
His place forgets him; other men
Have bought his ponies, guns, and traps.
His fortune is the Great Perhaps
And that cool rest-house down the glen,
Whence he shall hear, as spirits may,
Our mundane revel on the height,
Shall watch each flashing 'rickshaw-light
Sweep on to dinner, dance, and play.
Benmore shall woo him to the ball
With lighted rooms and braying band;
And he shall hear and understand
"Dream Faces" better than us all.
For, think you, as the vapours flee
Across Sanjaolie after rain,
His soul may climb the hill again
To each field of victory.
Unseen, who women held so dear,
The strong man's yearning to his kind
Shall shake at most the window-blind,
Or dull awhile the card-room's cheer.
@In his own place of power unknown,
His Light o' Love another's flame,
And he an alien and alone!
Yet may he meet with many a friend--
Shrewd shadows, lingering long unseen
Among us when "God save the Queen"
Shows even "extras" have an end.
And, when we leave the heated room,
And, when at four the lights expire,
The crew shall gather round the fire
And mock our laughter in the gloom;
Talk as we talked, and they ere death--
Flirt wanly, dance in ghostly-wise,
With ghosts of tunes for melodies,
And vanish at the morning's breath.
Dim dawn behind the tamarisks--the sky is saffron-yellow--
As the women in the village grind the corn,
And the parrots seek the riverside, each calling to his fellow
That the Day, the staring Easter Day is born.
Oh the white dust on the highway! Oh the stenches in the byway!
Oh the clammy fog that hovers o'er the earth;
Full day behind the tamarisks--the sky is blue and staring--
As the cattle crawl afield beneath the yoke,
Call on Rama, going slowly, as ye bear a brother lowly--
Call on Rama--he may hear, perhaps, your voice!
With our hymn-books and our psalters we appeal to other altars,
And today we bid "good Christian men rejoice!"
High noon behind the tamarisks--the sun is hot above us--
As at Home the Christmas Day is breaking wan.
Youth was cheap--wherefore we sold it.
Gold was good--we hoped to hold it,
And today we know the fulness of our gain.
Grey dusk behind the tamarisks--the parrots fly together--
As the sun is sinking slowly over Home;
And his last ray seems to mock us shackled in a lifelong tether.
That drags us back howe'er so far we roam.
If a year of life be lent her, if her temple's shrine we enter,
The door is shut--we may not look behind.
Black night behind the tamarisks--the owls begin their chorus--
As the conches from the temple scream and bray.
Call a truce, then, to our labors--let us feast with friends and
neighbors,
And be merry as the custom of our caste;
The toad beneath the harrow knows
Exactly where each tooth-point goes.
The butterfly upon the road
Preaches contentment to that toad.
Pagett, M.P., was a liar, and a fluent liar therewith--
He spoke of the heat of India as the "Asian Solar Myth";
Came on a four months' visit, to "study the East," in November,
And I got him to sign an agreement vowing to stay till September.
March came in with the koil. Pagett was cool and gay,
Called me a "bloated Brahmin," talked of my "princely pay."
March went out with the roses. "Where is your heat?" said he.
"Coming," said I to Pagett, "Skittles!" said Pagett, M.P.
April began with the punkah, coolies, and prickly-heat,--
Pagett was dear to mosquitoes, sandflies found him a treat.
He grew speckled and mumpy--hammered, I grieve to say,
Aryan brothers who fanned him, in an illiberal way.
May set in with a dust-storm,--Pagett went down with the sun.
All the delights of the season tickled him one by one.
Imprimis--ten day's "liver"--due to his drinking beer;
Later, a dose of fever--slight, but he called it severe.
Dysent'ry touched him in June, after the Chota Bursat--
Lowered his portly person--made him yearn to depart.
He didn't call me a "Brahmin," or "bloated," or "overpaid,"
But seemed to think it a wonder that any one stayed.
July was a trifle unhealthy,--Pagett was ill with fear.
'Called it the "Cholera Morbus," hinted that life was dear.
He babbled of "Eastern Exile," and mentioned his home with tears;
We reached a hundred and twenty once in the Court at noon,
(I've mentioned Pagett was portly) Pagett, went off in a swoon.
That was an end to the business; Pagett, the perjured, fled
With a practical, working knowledge of "Solar Myths" in his head.
How shall she know the worship we would do her?
The walls are high, and she is very far.
How shall the woman's message reach unto her
Above the tumult of the packed bazaar?
Free wind of March, against the lattice blowing,
Bear thou our thanks, lest she depart unknowing.
Go forth across the fields we may not roam in,
Go forth beyond the trees that rim the city,
To whatsoe'er fair place she hath her home in,
Who dowered us with wealth of love and pity.
Out of our shadow pass, and seek her singing--
"I have no gifts but Love alone for bringing."
Say that we be a feeble folk who greet her,
But old in grief, and very wise in tears;
Say that we, being desolate, entreat her
That she forget us not in after years;
For we have seen the light, and it were grievous
To dim that dawning if our lady leave us.
By life that ebbed with none to stanch the failing
By Love's sad harvest garnered in the spring,
When Love in ignorance wept unavailing
O'er young buds dead before their blossoming;
By all the grey owl watched, the pale moon viewed,
In past grim years, declare our gratitude!
By hands uplifted to the Gods that heard not,
By fits that found no favor in their sight,
By faces bent above the babe that stirred not,
By nameless horrors of the stifling night;
By ills foredone, by peace her toils discover,
Bid Earth be good beneath and Heaven above her!
If she have sent her servants in our pain
If she have fought with Death and dulled his sword;
If she have given back our sick again.
And to the breast the waking lips restored,
Is it a little thing that she has wrought?
Then Life and Death and Motherhood be nought.
Go forth, O wind, our message on thy wings,
And they shall hear thee pass and bid thee speed,
In reed-roofed hut, or white-walled home of kings,
Who have been helpen by her in their need.
All spring shall give thee fragrance, and the wheat
Shall be a tasselled floorcloth to thy feet.
Haste, for our hearts are with thee, take no rest!
Loud-voiced ambassador, from sea to sea
Proclaim the blessing, manifold, confessed.
Of those in darkness by her hand set free.
Then very softly to her presence move,
And whisper: "Lady, lo, they know and love!"
One moment bid the horses wait,
Since tiffin is not laid till three,
Below the upward path and straight
You climbed a year ago with me.
Love came upon us suddenly
And loosed--an idle hour to kill--
A headless, armless armory
That smote us both on Jakko Hill.
Ah Heaven! we would wait and wait
Ah Heaven! we could conquer Fate
With more than Godlike constancy
I cut the date upon a tree--
Here stand the clumsy figures still:
Damp with the mist of Jakko Hill.
What came of high resolve and great,
And until Death fidelity!
Whose horse is waiting at your gate?
Whose 'rickshaw-wheels ride over me?
No Saint's, I swear; and--let me see
Tonight what names your programme fill--
We drift asunder merrily,
As drifts the mist on Jakko Hill.
Princess, behold our ancient state
Has clean departed; and we see
'Twas Idleness we took for Fate
That bound light bonds on you and me.
Amen! Here ends the comedy
Where it began in all good will;
Since Love and Leave together flee
As driven mist on Jakko Hill!
Too late, alas! the song
To remedy the wrong;--
The rooms are taken from us, swept and
garnished for their fate.
But these tear-besprinkled pages
Shall attest to future ages
That we cried against the crime of it--
too late, alas! too late!
"What have we ever done to bear this grudge?"
Was there no room save only in Benmore
For docket, duftar, and for office drudge,
That you usurp our smoothest dancing floor?
Must babus do their work on polished teak?
Are ball-rooms fittest for the ink you spill?
Was there no other cheaper house to seek?
You might have left them all at Strawberry Hill.
We never harmed you! Innocent our guise,
Dainty our shining feet, our voices low;
And we revolved to divers melodies,
And we were happy but a year ago.
Tonight, the moon that watched our lightsome wiles--
That beamed upon us through the deodars--
Is wan with gazing on official files,
And desecrating desks disgust the stars.
Nay! by the memory of tuneful nights--
Nay! by the witchery of flying feet--
Nay! by the glamour of foredone delights--
By all things merry, musical, and meet--
By wine that sparkled, and by sparkling eyes--
By wailing waltz--by reckless galop's strain--
By dim verandas and by soft replies,
Give us our ravished ball-room back again!
Or--hearken to the curse we lay on you!
The ghosts of waltzes shall perplex your brain,
And murmurs of past merriment pursue
Your 'wildered clerks that they indite in vain;
And when you count your poor Provincial millions,
The only figures that your pen shall frame
Shall be the figures of dear, dear cotillions
Danced out in tumult long before you came.
Yea! "See Saw" shall upset your estimates,
"Dream Faces" shall your heavy heads bemuse,
Because your hand, unheeding, desecrates
Our temple; fit for higher, worthier use.
And all the long verandas, eloquent
With echoes of a score of Simla years,
Shall plague you with unbidden sentiment--
Babbling of kisses, laughter, love, and tears.
So shall you mazed amid old memories stand,
So shall you toil, and shall accomplish nought,
And ever in your ears a phantom Band
Shall blare away the staid official thought.
Wherefore--and ere this awful curse he spoken,
Cast out your swarthy sacrilegious train,
And give--ere dancing cease and hearts be broken--
Give us our ravished ball-room back again!
That night, when through the mooring-chains
The wide-eyed corpse rolled free,
To blunder down by Garden Reach
The tale the Hughli told the shoal
The lean shoal told to me.
'T was Fultah Fisher's boarding-house,
Where sailor-men reside,
And there were men of all the ports
And regally they spat and smoked,
And fearsomely they lied.
They lied about the purple Sea
That gave them scanty bread,
They lied about the Earth beneath,
The Heavens overhead,
For they had looked too often on
Black rum when that was red.
They told their tales of wreck and wrong,
Of shame and lust and fraud,
They backed their toughest statements with
And crackling oaths went to and fro
Across the fist-banged board.
And there was Hans the blue-eyed Dane,
Bull-throated, bare of arm,
Who carried on his hairy chest
The maid Ultruda's charm--
The little silver crucifix
That keeps a man from harm.
And there was Jake Without-the-Ears,
And Carboy Gin the Guinea cook,
And Luz from Vigo Bay,
And Honest Jack who sold them slops
And harvested their pay.
And there was Salem Hardieker,
A lean Bostonian he--
At Fultah Fisher's boarding-house
They rested from the sea.
Now Anne of Austria shared their drinks,
Collinga knew her fame,
To Juan Bazaar she came,
To eat the bread of infamy
And take the wage of shame.
She held a dozen men to heel--
Rich spoil of war was hers,
In hose and gown and ring and chain,
From twenty mariners,
And, by Port Law, that week, men called
her Salem Hardieker's.
But seamen learnt--what landsmen know--
That neither gifts nor gain
Can hold a winking Light o' Love
Or Fancy's flight restrain,
When Anne of Austria rolled her eyes
On Hans the blue-eyed Dane.
Since Life is strife, and strife means knife,
And he may die before the dawn
Who liquored out the day,
In Fultah Fisher's boarding-house
We woo while yet we may.
But cold was Hans the blue-eyed Dane,
Bull-throated, bare of arm,
And laughter shook the chest beneath
The maid Ultruda's charm--
The little silver crucifix
That keeps a man from harm.
"You speak to Salem Hardieker;
"You was his girl, I know.
"I ship mineselfs tomorrow, see,
"Und round the Skaw we go,
"South, down the Cattegat, by Hjelm,
When love rejected turns to hate,
All ill betide the man.
"You speak to Salem Hardieker"--
She spoke as woman can.
A scream--a sob--"He called me--names!"
And then the fray began.
An oath from Salem Hardieker,
A shriek upon the stairs,
A dance of shadows on the wall,
A knife-thrust unawares--
And Hans came down, as cattle drop,
Across the broken chairs.
In Anne of Austria's trembling hands
The weary head fell low:--
"I ship mineselfs tomorrow, straight
"Und there Ultruda comes to me
"At Easter, und I go--
"South, down the Cattegat--What's here?
The mutter ceased, the spirit passed,
And Anne of Austria cried
In Fultah Fisher's boarding-house
When Hans the mighty died.
Thus slew they Hans the blue-eyed Dane,
Bull-throated, bare of arm,
But Anne of Austria looted first
The maid Ultruda's charm--
The little silver crucifix
That keeps a man from harm.
As I left the Halls at Lumley, rose the vision of a comely
That was all--the rest was settled by the clinking tonga-bar.
Yea, my life and hers were coupled by the tonga coupling-bar.
For my misty meditation, at the second changin'-station,
Suffered sudden dislocation, fled before the tuneless jar
Of a Wagner obbligato, scherzo, doublehand staccato,
Played on either pony's saddle by the clacking tonga-bar--
Played with human speech, I fancied, by the jigging, jolting bar.
Heart of man--oh, heart of putty! Had I gone by Kakahutti,
On the old Hill-road and rutty, I had 'scaped that fatal car.
"You must call on Her tomorrow!"--post-horn gallop by the bar.
Yet a further stage my goal on--we were whirling down to Solon,
"'Been accepted or rejected!" banged and clanged the tonga-bar.
Then a notion wild and daring, 'spite the income tax's paring,
And a hasty thought of sharing--less than many incomes are,
"Simple Rule of Two will prove it," lilted back the tonga-bar.
It was under Khyraghaut I mused. "Suppose the maid be haughty--
(There are lovers rich--and rotty)--wait some wealthy Avatar?
Answer monitor untiring, 'twixt the ponies twain perspiring!"
"Can I tell you ere you ask Her?" pounded slow the tonga-bar.
Last, the Tara Devi turning showed the lights of Simla burning,
Lit my little lazy yearning to a fiercer flame by far.
As below the Mall we jingled, through my very heart it tingled--
Did the iterated order of the threshing tonga-bar--
So long as 'neath the Kalka hills
The tonga-horn shall ring,
So long as down the Solon dip
The hard-held ponies swing,
So long as Tara Devi sees
The lights of Simla town,
So long as Pleasure calls us up,
Or Duty drives us down,
If you love me as I love you
What pair so happy as we two?
So long as Aces take the King,
Or backers take the bet,
So long as debt leads men to wed,
Or marriage leads to debt,
So long as little luncheons, Love,
And scandal hold their vogue,
While there is sport at Annandale
Or whisky at Jutogh,
If you love me as I love you
What knife can cut our love in two?
So long as down the rocking floor
The raving polka spins,
So long as Kitchen Lancers spur
The maddened violins,
So long as through the whirling smoke
We hear the oft-told tale--
"Twelve hundred in the Lotteries,"
And Whatshername for sale?
If you love me as I love you
We'll play the game and win it too.
So long as Lust or Lucre tempt
Straight riders from the course,
So long as with each drink we pour
Black brewage of Remorse,
So long as those unloaded guns
We keep beside the bed,
Blow off, by obvious accident,
The lucky owner's head,
If you love me as I love you
What can Life kill or Death undo?
So long as Death 'twixt dance and dance
Chills best and bravest blood,
And drops the reckless rider down
The rotten, rain-soaked khud,
So long as rumours from the North
Make loving wives afraid,
So long as Burma takes the boy
Or typhoid kills the maid,
If you love me as I love you
What knife can cut our love in two?
By all that lights our daily life
Or works our lifelong woe,
And those grim glades below,
Where, heedless of the flying hoof
And clamour overhead,
Sleep, with the grey langur for guard
Our very scornful Dead,
If you love me as I love you
All Earth is servant to us two!
By Fan and Sword and Office-box,
By all the life that fizzes in
The everlasting Hills,
If you love me as I love you
What pair so happy as we two?
If It be pleasant to look on, stalled in the packed serai,
Does not the Young Man try Its temper and pace ere he buy?
If She be pleasant to look on, what does the Young Man say?
"Lo! She is pleasant to look on, give Her to me today!"
Yea, though a Kafir die, to him is remitted Jehannum
Blister we not for bursati? So when the heart is vexed,
Who are the rulers of Ind--to whom shall we bow the knee?
Make your peace with the women, and men will make you L. G.
Does the woodpecker flit round the young ferash?
Does grass clothe a new-built wall?
Is she under thirty, the woman who holds a boy in her thrall?
If She grow suddenly gracious--reflect. Is it all for thee?
Seek not for favor of women. So shall you find it indeed.
Does not the boar break cover just when you're lighting a weed?
With a "weed" among men or horses verily this is the best,
As the thriftless gold of the babul, so is the gold that we spend
The ways of man with a maid be strange, yet simple and tame
In public Her face is averted, with anger. She nameth thy name.
If She have spoken a word, remember thy lips are sealed,
If She have written a letter, delay not an instant, but burn it.
My Son, if a maiden deny thee and scufflingly bid thee give o'er,
She has been there before.
Though Allah and Earth pardon Sin, remaineth forever Remorse.
There's a widow in sleepy Chester
Who weeps for her only son;
There's a grave on the Pabeng River,
A grave that the Burmans shun,
And there's Subadar Prag Tewarri
Who tells how the work was done.
A Snider squibbed in the jungle,
Somebody laughed and fled,
Picked up their Subaltern dead,
With a big blue mark in his forehead
And the back blown out of his head.
Took command of the party,
Twenty rifles in all,
Marched them down to the river
As the day was beginning to fall.
They buried the boy by the river,
A blanket over his face--
They wept for their dead Lieutenant,
The men of an alien race--
They made a samadh in his honor,
A mark for his resting-place.
For they swore by the Holy Water,
They swore by the salt they ate,
That the soul of Lieutenant Eshmitt Sahib
Should go to his God in state;
With fifty file of Burman
To open him Heaven's gate.
Marched till the break of day,
Till they came to the rebel village,
The village of Pabengmay--
A jingal covered the clearing,
Calthrops hampered the way.
Bidding them load with ball,
Halted a dozen rifles
Under the village wall;
Sent out a flanking-party
Shouted and smote and slew,
Turning the grinning jingal
On to the howling crew.
The Jemadar's flanking-party
Butchered the folk who flew.
Long was the morn of slaughter,
Long was the list of slain,
Five score heads were taken,
Five score heads and twain;
Went back to their grave again,
Each man bearing a basket
Red as his palms that day,
Red as the blazing village--
The village of Pabengmay,
And the "drip-drip-drip" from the baskets
Reddened the grass by the way.
They made a pile of their trophies
High as a tall man's chin,
Head upon head distorted,
Set in a sightless grin,
Anger and pain and terror
Stamped on the smoke-scorched skin.
Put the head of the Boh
On the top of the mound of triumph,
The head of his son below,
With the sword and the peacock-banner
That the world might behold and know.
Thus the samadh was perfect,
Thus was the lesson plain
Of the wrath of the First Shikaris--
The price of a white man slain;
Went back into camp again.
Then a silence came to the river,
A hush fell over the shore,
And Bohs that were brave departed,
And Sniders squibbed no more;
For the Burmans said
That a kullah's head
Must be paid for with heads five score.
There's a widow in sleepy Chester
Who weeps for her only son;
There's a grave on the Pabeng River,
A grave that the Burmans shun,
And there's Subadar Prag Tewarri
Who tells how the work was done.
Beneath the deep veranda's shade,
When bats begin to fly,
I sit me down and watch--alas!--
Another evening die.
Blood-red behind the sere ferash
She rises through the haze.
Sainted Diana! can that be
Ah! shade of little Kitty Smith,
Say, was it ever thus at Home
The Moon of August shone,
When arm in arm we wandered long
Through Putney's evening haze,
And Hammersmith was Heaven beneath
But Wandle's stream is Sutlej now,
And Putney's evening haze
The dust that half a hundred kine
Before my window raise.
Unkempt, unclean, athwart the mist
The seething city looms,
In place of Putney's golden gorse
The sickly babul blooms.
Glare down, old Hecate, through the dust,
And bid the pie-dog yell,
Draw from the drain its typhoid-germ,
From each bazaar its smell;
Yea, suck the fever from the tank
And sap my strength therewith:
Thank Heaven, you show a smiling face
To little Kitty Smith!
In the name of the Empress of India, make way,
O Lords of the Jungle, wherever you roam.
The woods are astir at the close of the day--
We exiles are waiting for letters from Home.
Let the robber retreat--let the tiger turn tail--
With a jingle of bells as the dusk gathers in,
He turns to the foot-path that heads up the hill--
The bags on his back and a cloth round his chin,
And, tucked in his waist-belt, the Post Office bill:
"Despatched on this date, as received by the rail,
Per runner, two bags of the Overland Mail."
Is the torrent in spate? He must ford it or swim.
Has the rain wrecked the road? He must climb by the cliff.
Does the tempest cry "Halt"? What are tempests to him?
The Service admits not a "but" or and "if."
While the breath's in his mouth, he must bear without fail,
From aloe to rose-oak, from rose-oak to fir,
From level to upland, from upland to crest,
From rice-field to rock-ridge, from rock-ridge to spur,
Fly the soft sandalled feet, strains the brawny brown chest.
From rail to ravine--to the peak from the vale--
Up, up through the night goes the Overland Mail.
There's a speck on the hillside, a dot on the road--
A jingle of bells on the foot-path below--
There's a scuffle above in the monkey's abode--
The world is awake, and the clouds are aglow.
For the great Sun himself must attend to the hail:
"In the name of the Empress the Overland Mail!"
By the well, where the bullocks go
Silent and blind and slow--
By the field where the young corn dies
In the face of the sultry skies,
They have heard, as the dull Earth hears
The voice of the wind of an hour,
The sound of the Great Queen's voice:
"My God hath given me years,
Hath granted dominion and power:
And I bid you, O Land, rejoice."
And the ploughman settles the share
More deep in the grudging clod;
For he saith: "The wheat is my care,
And the rest is the will of God.
He sent the Mahratta spear
As He sendeth the rain,
And the Mlech, in the fated year,
Broke the spear in twain.
And was broken in turn. Who knows
How our Lords make strife?
It is good that the young wheat grows,
For the bread is Life."
Then, far and near, as the twilight drew,
Hissed up to the scornful dark
Great serpents, blazing, of red and blue,
That rose and faded, and rose anew.
That the Land might wonder and mark
"Today is a day of days," they said,
"Make merry, O People, all!"
And the Ploughman listened and bowed his head:
"Today and tomorrow God's will," he said,
As he trimmed the lamps on the wall.
"He sendeth us years that are good,
As He sendeth the dearth,
He giveth to each man his food,
Or Her food to the Earth.
Our Kings and our Queens are afar--
On their peoples be peace--
God bringeth the rain to the Bar,
That our cattle increase."
And the Ploughman settled the share
More deep in the sun-dried clod:
"Mogul Mahratta, and Mlech from the North,
And White Queen over the Seas--
God raiseth them up and driveth them forth
As the dust of the ploughshare flies in the breeze;
But the wheat and the cattle are all my care,
And the rest is the will of God."
"To-tschin-shu is condemned to death.
How can he drink tea with the Executioner?"
The eldest son bestrides him,
And the pretty daughter rides him,
And I meet him oft o' mornings on the Course;
And there kindles in my bosom
An emotion chill and gruesome
As I canter past the Undertaker's Horse.
Neither shies he nor is restive,
But a hideously suggestive
Trot, professional and placid, he affects;
And the cadence of his hoof-beats
To my mind this grim reproof beats:--
"Mend your pace, my friend, I'm coming. Who's the next?"
Ah! stud-bred of ill-omen,
I have watched the strongest go--men
Of pith and might and muscle--at your heels,
Down the plantain-bordered highway,
(Heaven send it ne'er be my way!)
In a lacquered box and jetty upon wheels.
Answer, sombre beast and dreary,
Where is Brown, the young, the cheery,
Smith, the pride of all his friends and half the Force?
You were at that last dread dak
We must cover at a walk,
Bring them back to me, O Undertaker's Horse!
With your mane unhogged and flowing,
And your curious way of going,
And that businesslike black crimping of your tail,
E'en with Beauty on your back, Sir,
Pacing as a lady's hack, Sir,
What wonder when I meet you I turn pale?
It may be you wait your time, Beast,
Till I write my last bad rhyme, Beast--
Quit the sunlight, cut the rhyming, drop the glass--
Follow after with the others,
Where some dusky heathen smothers
Us with marigolds in lieu of English grass.
Or, perchance, in years to follow,
I shall watch your plump sides hollow,
See Carnifex (gone lame) become a corse--
See old age at last o'erpower you,
And the Station Pack devour you,
I shall chuckle then, O Undertaker's Horse!
But to insult, jibe, and quest, I've
Still the hideously suggestive
Trot that hammers out the unrelenting text,
And I hear it hard behind me
In what place soe'er I find me:--
"'Sure to catch you sooner or later. Who's the next?"
This fell when dinner-time was done--
'Twixt the first an' the second rub--
That oor mon Jock cam' hame again
To his rooms ahist the Club.
An' syne he laughed, an' syne he sang,
An' syne we thocht him fou,
An' syne he trumped his partner's trick,
An' garred his partner rue.
Then up and spake an elder mon,
"God save the lad! Whence comes the licht
"That wimples on his face?"
An' ower the card-brim wunk:--
"I'm a' too fresh fra' the stirrup-peg,
"May be that I am drunk."
"There's whusky brewed in Galashils
"But never liquor lit the lowe
"That keeks fra' oot your eye.
"There's a third o' hair on your dress-coat breast,
"Aboon the heart a wee?"
"Oh! that is fra' the lang-haired Skye
"That slobbers ower me."
"Oh! lang-haired Skyes are lovin' beasts,
"An' terrier dogs are fair,
"But never yet was terrier born,
"Wi' ell-lang gowden hair!
"There's a smirch o' pouther on your breast,
"Below the left lappel?"
"Oh! that is fra' my auld cigar,
"Whenas the stump-end fell."
"Mon Jock, ye smoke the Trichi coarse,
"For ye are short o' cash,
"An' best Havanas couldna leave
"Sae white an' pure an ash.
"This nicht ye stopped a story braid,
"An' stopped it wi' a curse.
"Last nicht ye told that tale yoursel'--
"An' capped it wi' a worse!
"Oh! we're no fou! Oh! we're no fou!
"But plainly we can ken
"Ye're fallin', fallin' fra the band
"O' cantie single men!"
An' it fell when sirris-shaws were sere,
An' the nichts were lang and mirk,
In braw new breeks, wi' a gowden ring,
Oor Jock gaed to the Kirk!
A great and glorious thing it is
To learn, for seven years or so,
The Lord knows what of that and this,
Ere reckoned fit to face the foe--
The flying bullet down the Pass,
That whistles clear: "All flesh is grass."
Three hundred pounds per annum spent
On making brain and body meeter
For all the murderous intent
Comprised in "villainous saltpetre!"
And after--ask the Yusufzaies
What comes of all our 'ologies.
A scrimmage in a Border Station--
A canter down some dark defile--
Two thousand pounds of education
Drops to a ten-rupee jezail--
The Crammer's boast, the Squadron's pride,
Shot like a rabbit in a ride!
No proposition Euclid wrote,
No formulae the text-books know,
Will turn the bullet from your coat,
Or ward the tulwar's downward blow
Strike hard who cares--shoot straight who can--
The odds are on the cheaper man.
One sword-knot stolen from the camp
Will pay for all the school expenses
Of any Kurrum Valley scamp
Who knows no word of moods and tenses,
But, being blessed with perfect sight,
Picks off our messmates left and right.
With home-bred hordes the hillsides teem,
The troop-ships bring us one by one,
At vast expense of time and steam,
To slay Afridis where they run.
The "captives of our bow and spear"
Are cheap--alas! as we are dear.
"You must choose between me and your cigar."
Open the old cigar-box, get me a Cuba stout,
For things are running crossways, and Maggie and I are out.
We quarrelled about Havanas--we fought o'er a good cheroot,
And I knew she is exacting, and she says I am a brute.
Open the old cigar-box--let me consider a space;
In the soft blue veil of the vapour musing on Maggie's face.
Maggie is pretty to look at--Maggie's a loving lass,
There's peace in a Larranaga, there's calm in a Henry Clay;
But the best cigar in an hour is finished and thrown away--
Thrown away for another as perfect and ripe and brown--
Maggie, my wife at fifty--grey and dour and old--
With never another Maggie to purchase for love or gold!
The butt of a dead cigar you are bound to keep in your pocket--
Open the old cigar-box--let me consider a while.
Here is a mild Manila--there is a wifely smile.
Which is the better portion--bondage bought with a ring,
Or a harem of dusky beauties, fifty tied in a string?
Counsellors cunning and silent--comforters true and tried,
And never a one of the fifty to sneer at a rival bride?
Thought in the early morning, solace in time of woes,
Peace in the hush of the twilight, balm ere my eyelids close,
This will the fifty give me, asking nought in return,
With only a Suttee's passion--to do their duty and burn.
This will the fifty give me. When they are spent and dead,
Five times other fifties shall be my servants instead.
The furrows of far-off Java, the isles of the Spanish Main,
When they hear my harem is empty will send me my brides again.
For Maggie has written a letter to give me my choice between
The wee little whimpering Love and the great god Nick o' Teen.
And I have been servant of Love for barely a twelvemonth clear,
But I have been Priest of Cabanas a matter of seven year;
And I turn my eyes to the future that Maggie and I must prove,
Open the old cigar-box--let me consider anew--
Old friends, and who is Maggie that I should abandon you?
A million surplus Maggies are willing to bear the yoke;
And a woman is only a woman, but a good Cigar is a Smoke.
Light me another Cuba--I hold to my first-sworn vows.
If Maggie will have no rival, I'll have no Maggie for Spouse!
Where the sober-colored cultivator smiles
On his byles;
Where the cholera, the cyclone, and the crow
Where the merchant deals in indigo and tea,
Hides and ghi;
Where the Babu drops inflammatory hints
In his prints;
Stands a City--Charnock chose it--packed away
By the Sewage rendered fetid, by the sewer
Made impure,
By the Sunderbunds unwholesome, by the swamp
Moist and damp;
And the City and the Viceroy, as we see,
Don't agree.
Once, two hundred years ago, the trader came
Meek and tame.
Where his timid foot first halted, there he stayed,
Till mere trade
Grew to Empire, and he sent his armies forth
Till the country from Peshawur to Ceylon
Was his own.
Thus the midday halt of Charnock--more's the pity!
As the fungus sprouts chaotic from its bed,
So it spread--
Chance-directed, chance-erected, laid and built
On the silt--
Palace, byre, hovel--poverty and pride--
Side by side;
And, above the packed and pestilential town,
Death looked down.
But the Rulers in that City by the Sea
Turned to flee--
Fled, with each returning spring-tide from its ills
From the clammy fogs of morning, from the blaze
Of old days,
From the sickness of the noontide, from the heat,
Beat retreat;
For the country from Peshawur to Ceylon
Was their own.
But the Merchant risked the perils of the Plain
For his gain.
Now the resting-place of Charnock, 'neath the palms,
Asks an alms,
And the burden of its lamentation is,
Briefly, this:
"Because for certain months, we boil and stew,
So should you.
Cast the Viceroy and his Council, to perspire
In our fire!"
And for answer to the argument, in vain
We explain
That an amateur Saint Lawrence cannot fry:
"All must fry!"
That the Merchant risks the perils of the Plain
For gain.
Nor can Rulers rule a house that men grow rich in,
From its kitchen.
Let the Babu drop inflammatory hints
In his prints;
And mature--consistent soul--his plan for stealing
Let the Merchant seek, who makes his silver pile,
England's isle;
Let the City Charnock pitched on--evil day!
Go Her way.
Though the argosies of Asia at Her doors
Heap their stores,
Though Her enterprise and energy secure
Income sure,
Though "out-station orders punctually obeyed"
Swell Her trade--
Still, for rule, administration, and the rest,
Simla's best.
Oh, East is East, and West is West, and never the twain shall
meet,
Till Earth and Sky stand presently at God's great Judgment
But there is neither East nor West, Border, nor Breed, nor Birth,
tho' they come from the ends of the earth!
Kamal is out with twenty men to raise the Border-side,
And he has lifted the Colonel's mare that is the Colonel's pride:
Then up and spoke Mahommed Khan, the son of the Ressaldar:
"At dusk he harries the Abazai--at dawn he is into Bonair,
But he must go by Fort Bukloh to his own place to fare,
So if ye gallop to Fort Bukloh as fast as a bird can fly,
The Colonel's son has taken a horse, and a raw rough dun was he,
The Colonel's son to the Fort has won, they bid him stay to eat--
He's up and away from Fort Bukloh as fast as he can fly,
It's up and over the Tongue of Jagai, as blown dustdevils go,
The dun he leaned against the bit and slugged his head above,
The dun he fell at a water-course--in a woful heap fell he,
"If I had raised my bridle-hand, as I have held it low,
The little jackals that flee so fast were feasting all in a row:
If I had bowed my head on my breast, as I have held it high,
"If there should follow a thousand swords to carry my bones away,
Kamal has gripped him by the hand and set him upon his feet.
"May I eat dirt if thou hast hurt of me in deed or breath;
So she shall go with a lifter's dower, my turquoise-studded rein,
"Ye have taken the one from a foe," said he;
"will ye take the mate from a friend?"
"Thy father has sent his son to me, I'll send my son to him!"
Till Death or I cut loose the tie, at camp and board and bed,
Thy life is his--thy fate it is to guard him with thy head.
The Colonel's son he rides the mare and Kamal's boy the dun,
"Ha' done! ha' done!" said the Colonel's son.
"Put up the steel at your sides!
Last night ye had struck at a Border thief--
tonight 'tis a man of the Guides!"
But there is neither East nor West, Border, nor Breed, nor Birth,
tho' they come from the ends of the earth!
Udai Chand lay sick to death
In his hold by Gungra hill.
All night we heard the death-gongs ring
For the soul of the dying Rajpoot King,
All night beat up from the women's wing
A cry that we could not still.
All night the barons came and went,
The lords of the outer guard:
All night the cressets glimmered pale
On Ulwar sabre and Tonk jezail,
Mewar headstall and Marwar mail,
That clinked in the palace yard.
In the Golden room on the palace roof
All night he fought for air:
And there was sobbing behind the screen,
Rustle and whisper of women unseen,
And the hungry eyes of the Boondi Queen
On the death she might not share.
He passed at dawn--the death-fire leaped
From ridge to river-head,
From the Malwa plains to the Abu scars:
And wail upon wail went up to the stars
Behind the grim zenana-bars,
When they knew that the King was dead.
And robe him for the pyre.
The Boondi Queen beneath us cried:
"See, now, that we die as our mothers died
In the bridal-bed by our master's side!
Out, women!--to the fire!"
We drove the great gates home apace:
White hands were on the sill:
But ere the rush of the unseen feet
Had reached the turn to the open street,
The bars shot down, the guard-drum beat--
We held the dovecot still.
A face looked down in the gathering day,
And laughing spoke from the wall:
"Ohe', they mourn here:  let me by--
Azizun, the  Lucknow nautch-girl, I!
When the house is rotten, the rats must fly,
And I seek another thrall.
"For I ruled the King as ne'er did Queen,--
Tonight the Queens rule me!
Guard them safely, but let me go,
Or ever they pay the debt they owe
In scourge and torture!"  She leaped below,
And the grim guard watched her flee.
They knew that the King had spent his soul
On a North-bred dancing-girl:
That he prayed to a flat-nosed Lucknow god,
And kissed the ground where her feet had trod,
And doomed to death at her drunken nod,
And swore by her lightest curl.
We bore the King to his fathers' place,
Where the tombs of the Sun-born stand:
Where the gray apes swing, and the peacocks preen
And the wild boar couch in the house of the Queen
On the drift of the desert sand.
The herald read his titles forth,
We set the logs aglow:
"Friend of the English, free from fear,
King of the Jungle,--go!"
All night the red flame stabbed the sky
With wavering wind-tossed spears:
And out of a shattered temple crept
A woman who veiled her head and wept,
And called on the King--but the great King slept,
And turned not for her tears.
Small thought had he to mark the strife--
Cold fear with hot desire--
When thrice she leaped from the leaping flame,
And thrice she beat her breast for shame,
And thrice like a wounded dove she came
And moaned about the fire.
One watched, a bow-shot from the blaze,
The silent streets between,
Who had stood by the King in sport and fray,
To blade in ambush or boar at bay,
And he was a baron old and gray,
He said: "O shameless, put aside
The veil upon thy brow!
Who held the King and all his land
To the wanton will of a harlot's hand!
Will the white ash rise from the blistered brand?
Stoop down, and call him now!"
Then she:  "By the faith of my tarnished soul,
All things I did not well,
I had hoped to clear ere the fire died,
And lay me down by my master's side
To rule in Heaven his only bride,
While the others howl in Hell.
"But I have felt the fire's breath,
And hard it is to die!
Yet if I may pray a Rajpoot lord
To sully the steel of a Thakur's sword
With base-born blood of a trade abhorred,"--
And the Thakur answered, "Ay."
He drew and struck:  the straight blade drank
The life beneath the breast.
"I had looked for the Queen to face the flame,
But the harlot dies for the Rajpoot dame--
Sister of mine, pass, free from shame,
Pass with thy King to rest!"
The black log crashed above the white:
The little flames and lean,
Red as slaughter and blue as steel,
That whistled and fluttered from head to heel,
Leaped up anew, for they found their meal
On the heart of--the Boondi Queen!
of him is the story told.
His mercy fills the Khyber hills--
his grace is manifold;
He has taken toll of the North and the South--
his glory reacheth far,
And they tell the tale of his charity
from Balkh to Kandahar.
Before the old Peshawur Gate, where Kurd and Kaffir meet,
The Governor of Kabul dealt the Justice of the Street,
And that was strait as running noose and swift as plunging knife,
There was a hound of Hindustan had struck a Euzufzai,
Wherefore they spat upon his face and led him out to die.
And he was honoured of the King--the which is salt to Death;
And blood of old Durani Lords ran fire in his veins;
And 'twas to tame an Afghan pride nor Hell nor Heaven could bind,
to the North and the South is sold.
The North and the South shall open their mouth
to a Ghilzai flag unrolled,
When the big guns speak to the Khyber peak,
and his dog-Heratis fly:
Ye have heard the song--How long? How long?
And grimly said the Afghan King:  "I rule the Afghan race.
My path is mine--see thou to thine--tonight upon thy bed
Think who there be in Kabul now that clamour for thy head."
That night when all the gates were shut to City and to throne,
Within a little garden-house the King lay down alone.
Before the sinking of the moon, which is the Night of Night,
Yar Khan came softly to the King to make his honour white.
The children of the town had mocked beneath his horse's hoofs,
But as he groped against the wall, two hands upon him fell,
And that thou bearest in thy hand is all too sharp to write.
For I am merciful to all, and most of all to thee.
"My butcher of the shambles, rest--no knife hast thou for me!"
holds hard by the South and the North;
But the Ghilzai knows, ere the melting snows,
when the swollen banks break forth,
When the red-coats crawl to the sungar wall,
and his Usbeg lances fail:
Ye have heard the song--How long? How long?
They stoned him in the rubbish-field when dawn was in the sky,
According to the written word, "See that he do not die."
One watched beside the dreary mound that veiled the battered
thing,
And him the King with laughter called the Herald of the King.
It was upon the second night, the night of Ramazan,
The watcher leaning earthward heard the message of Yar Khan.
"Bid him endure until the day," a lagging answer came;
"The night is short, and he can pray and learn to bless my name."
Before the dawn three times he spoke, and on the day once more:
"Creature of God, deliver me, and bless the King therefor!"
They shot him at the morning prayer, to ease him of his pain,
Which thing the singers made a song for all the world to sing,
So that the Outer Seas may know the mercy of the King.
of him is the story told,
He has opened his mouth to the North and the South,
they have stuffed his mouth with gold.
Ye know the truth of his tender ruth--
and sweet his favours are:
Ye have heard the song--How long? How long?
from Balkh to Kandahar.
When spring-time flushes the desert grass,
Our kafilas wind through the Khyber Pass.
Lean are the camels but fat the frails,
Light are the purses but heavy the bales,
As the snowbound trade of the North comes down
To the market-square of Peshawur town.
In a turquoise twilight, crisp and chill,
A kafila camped at the foot of the hill.
Then blue smoke-haze of the cooking rose,
And tent-peg answered to hammer-nose;
And the picketed ponies, shag and wild,
Strained at their ropes as the feed was piled;
And the bubbling camels beside the load
Sprawled for a furlong adown the road;
Spat at the dogs from the camel-bale;
And the tribesmen bellowed to hasten the food;
And the camp-fires twinkled by Fort Jumrood;
And there fled on the wings of the gathering dusk
A savour of camels and carpets and musk,
A murmur of voices, a reek of smoke,
To tell us the trade of the Khyber woke.
The lid of the flesh-pot chattered high,
The knives were whetted and--then came I
To Mahbub Ali the muleteer,
Patching his bridles and counting his gear,
Crammed with the gossip of half a year.
But Mahbub Ali the kindly said,
"Better is speech when the belly is fed."
So we plunged the hand to the mid-wrist deep
In a cinnamon stew of the fat-tailed sheep,
And he who never hath tasted the food,
By Allah! he knoweth not bad from good.
We cleansed our beards of the mutton-grease,
We lay on the mats and were filled with peace,
And the talk slid north, and the talk slid south,
With the sliding puffs from the hookah-mouth.
Four things greater than all things are,--
We spake of them all, but the last the most,
For I sought a word of a Russian post,
Of a shifty promise, an unsheathed sword
And a gray-coat guard on the Helmund ford.
Then Mahbub Ali lowered his eyes
In the fashion of one who is weaving lies.
Quoth he: "Of the Russians who can say?
When the night is gathering all is gray.
But we look that the gloom of the night shall die
In the morning flush of a blood-red sky.
"Friend of my heart, is it meet or wise
To warn a King of his enemies?
We know what Heaven or Hell may bring,
But no man knoweth the mind of the King.
"That unsought counsel is cursed of God
Attesteth the story of Wali Dad.
"His sire was leaky of tongue and pen,
His dam was a clucking Khuttuck hen;
And the colt bred close to the vice of each,
For he carried the curse of an unstanched speech.
"Therewith madness--so that he sought
The favour of kings at the Kabul court;
And travelled, in hope of honour, far
To the line where the gray-coat squadrons are.
"There have I journeyed too--but I
Saw naught, said naught, and--did not die!
He harked to rumour, and snatched at a breath
Of 'this one knoweth' and 'that one saith',--
Legends that ran from mouth to mouth
Of a gray-coat coming, and sack of the South.
"These have I also heard--they pass
With each new spring and the winter grass.
"Hot-foot southward, forgotten of God,
Back to the city ran Wali Dad,
Even to Kabul--in full durbar
The King held talk with his Chief in War.
"Into the press of the crowd he broke,
And what he had heard of the coming spoke.
"Then Gholam Hyder, the Red Chief, smiled,
As a mother might on a babbling child;
But those who would laugh restrained their breath,
When the face of the King showed dark as death.
"Evil it is in full durbar
To cry to a ruler of gathering war!
Slowly he led to a peach-tree small,
That grew by a cleft of the city wall.
"And he said to the boy: 'They shall praise thy zeal
So long as the red spurt follows the steel.
"And the Russ is upon us even now?
Great is thy prudence--await them, thou.
Watch from the tree.  Thou art young and strong,
Surely thy vigil is not for long.
"The Russ is upon us, thy clamour ran?
Surely an hour shall bring their van.
Wait and watch.  When the host is near,
Shout aloud that my men may hear.'
"Friend of my heart, is it meet or wise
To warn a King of his enemies?
A guard was set that he might not flee--
A score of bayonets ringed the tree.
"The peach-bloom fell in showers of snow,
When he shook at his death as he looked below.
By the power of God, who alone is great,
Till the seventh day he fought with his fate.
"Then madness took him, and men declare
He mowed in the branches as ape and bear,
And last as a sloth, ere his body failed,
And he hung as a bat in the forks, and wailed,
And sleep the cord of his hands untied,
And he fell, and was caught on the points and died.
"Heart of my heart, is it meet or wise
To warn a King of his enemies?
We know what Heaven or Hell may bring,
But no man knoweth the mind of the King.
"Of the gray-coat coming who can say?
When the night is gathering all is gray.
"To things greater than all things are,
The first is Love, and the second War.
"And since we know not how War may prove,
Heart of my heart, let us talk of Love!"
This is the ballad of Boh Da Thone,
Erst a Pretender to Theebaw's throne,
Who harried the district of Alalone:
How he met with his fate and the V.P.P.
At the hand of Harendra Mukerji,
Boh Da Thone was a warrior bold:
His sword and his Snider were bossed with gold,
And the Peacock Banner his henchmen bore
Was stiff with bullion, but stiffer with gore.
He shot at the strong and he slashed at the weak
From the Salween scrub to the Chindwin teak:
He crucified noble, he sacrificed mean,
He filled old ladies with kerosene:
While over the water the papers cried,
"The patriot fights for his countryside!"
But little they cared for the Native Press,
The worn white soldiers in Khaki dress,
Who tramped through the jungle and camped in the byre,
Who died in the swamp and were tombed in the mire,
Who gave up their lives, at the Queen's Command,
For the Pride of their Race and the Peace of the Land.
Now, first of the foemen of Boh Da Thone
And his was a Company, seventy strong,
Who hustled that dissolute Chief along.
There were lads from Galway and Louth and Meath
Who went to their death with a joke in their teeth,
And worshipped with fluency, fervour, and zeal
The mud on the boot-heels of "Crook" O'Neil.
But ever a blight on their labours lay,
And ever their quarry would vanish away,
Till the sun-dried boys of the Black Tyrone
Took a brotherly interest in Boh Da Thone:
And, sooth, if pursuit in possession ends,
The Boh and his trackers were best of friends.
The word of a scout--a march by night--
A rush through the mist--a scattering fight--
A volley from cover--a corpse in the clearing--
The glimpse of a loin-cloth and heavy jade earring--
The flare of a village--the tally of slain--
And. . .the Boh was abroad "on the raid" again!
They cursed their luck, as the Irish will,
They gave him credit for cunning and skill,
They buried their dead, they bolted their beef,
And started anew on the track of the thief
Till, in place of the "Kalends of Greece", men said,
"When Crook and his darlings come back with the head."
They had hunted the Boh from the hills to the plain--
He doubled and broke for the hills again:
They had crippled his power for rapine and raid,
They had routed him out of his pet stockade,
And at last, they came, when the Day Star tired,
To a camp deserted--a village fired.
A black cross blistered the Morning-gold,
And the body upon it was stark and cold.
The wind of the dawn went merrily past,
The high grass bowed her plumes to the blast.
And out of the grass, on a sudden, broke
A spirtle of fire, a whorl of smoke--
Was blessed with a slug in the ulnar-bone--
The gift of his enemy Boh Da Thone.
(Now a slug that is hammered from telegraph-wire
Is a thorn in the flesh and a rankling fire.)
The shot-wound festered--as shot-wounds may
In a steaming barrack at Mandalay.
The left arm throbbed, and the Captain swore,
"I'd like to be after the Boh once more!"
The fever held him--the Captain said,
"I'd give a hundred to look at his head!"
The Hospital punkahs creaked and whirred,
But Babu Harendra (Gomashta) heard.
He thought of the cane-brake, green and dank,
That girdled his home by the Dacca tank.
He thought of his wife and his High School son,
He thought--but abandoned the thought--of a gun.
His sleep was broken by visions dread
Of a shining Boh with a silver head.
He kept his counsel and went his way,
And swindled the cartmen of half their pay.
And the months went on, as the worst must do,
And the Boh returned to the raid anew.
But the Captain had quitted the long-drawn strife,
And in far Simoorie had taken a wife.
And she was a damsel of delicate mould,
With hair like the sunshine and heart of gold,
And little she knew the arms that embraced
Had cloven a man from the brow to the waist:
And little she knew that the loving lips
Had ordered a quivering life's eclipse,
And the eye that lit at her lightest breath
Had glared unawed in the Gates of Death.
(For these be matters a man would hide,
As a general rule, from an innocent Bride.)
And little the Captain thought of the past,
And, of all men, Babu Harendra last.
But slow, in the sludge of the Kathun road,
The Government Bullock Train toted its load.
Speckless and spotless and shining with ghee,
In the rearmost cart sat the Babu-jee.
And ever a phantom before him fled
Of a scowling Boh with a silver head.
Then the lead-cart stuck, though the coolies slaved,
And the cartmen flogged and the escort raved;
And out of the jungle, with yells and squeals,
Pranced Boh Da Thone, and his gang at his heels!
Then belching blunderbuss answered back
The Snider's snarl and the carbine's crack,
And the blithe revolver began to sing
To the blade that twanged on the locking-ring,
And the brown flesh blued where the bay'net kissed,
As the steel shot back with a wrench and a twist,
And the great white bullocks with onyx eyes
Watched the souls of the dead arise,
And over the smoke of the fusillade
The Peacock Banner staggered and swayed.
Oh, gayest of scrimmages man may see
Is a well-worked rush on the G.B.T.!
The Babu shook at the horrible sight,
And girded his ponderous loins for flight,
But Fate had ordained that the Boh should start
On a lone-hand raid of the rearmost cart,
And out of that cart, with a bellow of woe,
The Babu fell--flat on the top of the Boh!
For years had Harendra served the State,
To the growth of his purse and the girth of his _pet_.
There were twenty stone, as the tally-man knows,
On the broad of the chest of this best of Bohs.
And twenty stone from a height discharged
Are bad for a Boh with a spleen enlarged.
Oh, short was the struggle--severe was the shock--
He dropped like a bullock--he lay like a block;
And the Babu above him, convulsed with fear,
Heard the labouring life-breath hissed out in his ear.
And thus in a fashion undignified
The princely pest of the Chindwin died.
Turn now to Simoorie where, lapped in his ease,
The Captain is petting the Bride on his knees,
Where the whit of the bullet, the wounded man's scream
Are mixed as the mist of some devilish dream--
Forgotten, forgotten the sweat of the shambles
Where the hill-daisy blooms and the gray monkey gambols,
From the sword-belt set free and released from the steel,
The Peace of the Lord is with Captain O'Neil.
Up the hill to Simoorie--most patient of drudges--
The bags on his shoulder, the mail-runner trudges.
"For Captain O'Neil, Sahib.  One hundred and ten
Rupees to collect on delivery."
(Their breakfast was stopped while the screw-jack and hammer
Tore waxcloth, split teak-wood, and chipped out the dammer;)
Open-eyed, open-mouthed, on the napery's snow,
With a crash and a thud, rolled--the Head of the Boh!
And gummed to the scalp was a letter which ran:--
"Dear Sir,--I have honour to send, as you said,
For final approval (see under) Boh's Head;
"Was took by myself in most bloody affair.
By High Education brought pressure to bear.
"Now violate Liberty, time being bad,
To mail V.P.P. (rupees hundred)  Please add
"Whatever Your Honour can pass.  Price of Blood
Much cheap at one hundred, and children want food;
"So trusting Your Honour will somewhat retain
True love and affection for Govt. Bullock Train,
"And show awful kindness to satisfy me,
I am,
As the rabbit is drawn to the rattlesnake's power,
As the smoker's eye fills at the opium hour,
As a horse reaches up to the manger above,
As the waiting ear yearns for the whisper of love,
From the arms of the Bride, iron-visaged and slow,
The Captain bent down to the Head of the Boh.
And e'en as he looked on the Thing where It lay
'Twixt the winking new spoons and the napkins' array,
The freed mind fled back to the long-ago days--
The hand-to-hand scuffle--the smoke and the blaze--
The forced march at night and the quick rush at dawn--
The banjo at twilight, the burial ere morn--
The stench of the marshes--the raw, piercing smell
When the overhand stabbing-cut silenced the yell--
The oaths of his Irish that surged when they stood
Where the black crosses hung o'er the Kuttamow flood.
As a derelict ship drifts away with the tide
The Captain went out on the Past from his Bride,
Back, back, through the springs to the chill of the year,
When he hunted the Boh from Maloon to Tsaleer.
As the shape of a corpse dimmers up through deep water,
In his eye lit the passionless passion of slaughter,
And men who had fought with O'Neil for the life
Had gazed on his face with less dread than his wife.
For she who had held him so long could not hold him--
Though a four-month Eternity should have controlled him--
But watched the twin Terror--the head turned to head--
The scowling, scarred Black, and the flushed savage Red--
The spirit that changed from her knowing and flew to
Some grim hidden Past she had never a clue to.
But It knew as It grinned, for he touched it unfearing,
And muttered aloud, "So you kept that jade earring!"
Then nodded, and kindly, as friend nods to friend,
"Old man, you fought well, but you lost in the end."
The visions departed, and Shame followed Passion:--
"He took what I said in this horrible fashion,
"I'll write to Harendra!"  With language unsainted
The Captain came back to the Bride. . .who had fainted.
And this is a fiction?  No.  Go to Simoorie
And look at their baby, a twelve-month old Houri,
A pert little, Irish-eyed Kathleen Mavournin--
She's always about on the Mall of a mornin'--
And you'll see, if her right shoulder-strap is displaced,
This:  Gules upon argent, a Boh's Head, erased!
O woe is me for the merry life
I led beyond the Bar,
And a treble woe for my winsome wife
That weeps at Shalimar.
They have taken away my long jezail,
My shield and sabre fine,
And heaved me into the Central jail
For lifting of the kine.
The steer may low within the byre,
The Jat may tend his grain,
But there'll be neither loot nor fire
Till I come back again.
And God have mercy on the Jat
When once my fetters fall,
And Heaven defend the farmer's hut
When I am loosed from thrall.
It's woe to bend the stubborn back
Above the grinching quern,
It's woe to hear the leg-bar clack
And jingle when I turn!
But for the sorrow and the shame,
The brand on me and mine,
I'll pay you back in leaping flame
And loss of the butchered kine.
For every cow I spared before
In charity set free,
If I may reach my hold once more
I'll reive an honest three.
For every time I raised the low
That scared the dusty plain,
By sword and cord, by torch and tow
I'll light the land with twain!
Ride hard, ride hard to Abazai,
Young Sahib with the yellow hair--
Lie close, lie close as khuttucks lie,
Fat herds below Bonair!
The one I'll shoot at twilight-tide,
At dawn I'll drive the other;
The black shall mourn for hoof and hide,
The white man for his brother.
'Tis war, red war, I'll give you then,
War till my sinews fail;
For the wrong you have done to a chief of men,
And a thief of the Zukka Kheyl.
And if I fall to your hand afresh
I give you leave for the sin,
That you cram my throat with the foul pig's flesh,
And swing me in the skin!
. . . At the close of a winter day,
Their anchors down, by London town, the Three Great Captains lay;
And one was Lord of the Wessex coast and all the lands thereby,
And one was Master of the Thames from Limehouse to Blackwall,
And he was Captain of the Fleet--the bravest of them all.
When there came a certain trading-brig with news of a privateer.
I had no fear but the seas were clear as far as a sail might fare
"He would not fly the Rovers' flag--the bloody or the black,
But now he floated the Gridiron and now he flaunted the Jack.
"He has taken my little parrakeets that nest beneath the Line,
"Had I had guns (as I had goods) to work my Christian harm,
"There is never a Law on the Cocos Keys to hold a white man in,
By two and three the flags blew free to lash the laughing air:--
Flying his pluck at our mizzen-truck for weft of Admiralty,
It was our war-ship Clampherdown
Would sweep the Channel clean,
Wherefore she kept her hatches close
When the merry Channel chops arose,
To save the bleached marine.
She had one bow-gun of a hundred ton,
And a great stern-gun beside;
They dipped their noses deep in the sea,
They racked their stays and stanchions free
In the wash of the wind-whipped tide.
It was our war-ship Clampherdown,
Fell in with a cruiser light
That carried the dainty Hotchkiss gun
And a pair o' heels wherewith to run
From the grip of a close-fought fight.
She opened fire at seven miles--
As ye shoot at a bobbing cork--
And once she fired and twice she fired,
Till the bow-gun drooped like a lily tired
That lolls upon the stalk.
"Captain, the bow-gun melts apace,
The deck-beams break below,
'Twere well to rest for an hour or twain,
And patch the shattered plates again."
And he answered, "Make it so."
She opened fire within the mile--
As ye shoot at the flying duck--
And the great stern-gun shot fair and true,
With the heave of the ship, to the stainless blue,
And the great stern-turret stuck.
"Captain, the turret fills with steam,
The feed-pipes burst below--
You can hear the hiss of the helpless ram,
You can hear the twisted runners jam."
And he answered, "Turn and go!"
It was our war-ship Clampherdown,
And grimly did she roll;
Swung round to take the cruiser's fire
As the White Whale faces the Thresher's ire
When they war by the frozen Pole.
"Captain, the shells are falling fast,
And faster still fall we;
And it is not meet for English stock
To bide in the heart of an eight-day clock
The death they cannot see."
"Lie down, lie down, my bold A.B.,
We drift upon her beam;
We dare not ram, for she can run;
And dare ye fire another gun,
And die in the peeling steam?"
It was our war-ship Clampherdown
That carried an armour-belt;
But fifty feet at stern and bow
Lay bare as the paunch of the purser's sow,
To the hail of the Nordenfeldt.
"Captain, they hack us through and through;
The chilled steel bolts are swift!
We have emptied the bunkers in open sea,
Their shrapnel bursts where our coal should be."
And he answered, "Let her drift."
It was our war-ship Clampherdown,
Swung round upon the tide,
And the blood and the bubbling steam ran forth,
And she ground the cruiser's side.
"Captain, they cry, the fight is done,
They bid you send your sword."
And he answered, "Grapple her stern and bow.
They have asked for the steel.  They shall have it now;
Out cutlasses and board!"
It was our war-ship Clampherdown
Spewed up four hundred men;
And the scalded stokers yelped delight,
As they rolled in the waist and heard the fight
Stamp o'er their steel-walled pen.
They cleared the cruiser end to end,
From conning-tower to hold.
They fought as they fought in Nelson's fleet;
They were stripped to the waist, they were bare to the feet,
As it was in the days of old.
It was the sinking Clampherdown
Heaved up her battered side--
And carried a million pounds in steel,
To the cod and the corpse-fed conger-eel,
And the scour of the Channel tide.
It was the crew of the Clampherdown
Stood out to sweep the sea,
On a cruiser won from an ancient foe,
As it was in the days of long ago,
And as it still shall be.
Seven men from all the world, back to Docks again,
Rolling down the Ratcliffe Road drunk and raising Cain:
Give the girls another drink 'fore we sign away--
We that took the Bolivar out across the Bay!
We put out from Sunderland loaded down with rails;
We put back to Sunderland 'cause our cargo shifted;
We put out from Sunderland--met the winter gales--
Seven days and seven nights to the Start we drifted.
Racketing her rivets loose, smoke-stack white as snow,
All the coals adrift adeck, half the rails below,
Leaking like a lobster-pot, steering like a dray--
Out we took the Bolivar, out across the Bay!
One by one the Lights came up, winked and let us by;
Mile by mile we waddled on, coal and fo'c'sle short;
Met a blow that laid us down, heard a bulkhead fly;
Left the Wolf behind us with a two-foot list to port.
Trailing like a wounded duck, working out her soul;
Clanging like a smithy-shop after every roll;
Just a funnel and a mast lurching through the spray--
So we threshed the Bolivar out across the Bay!
'Felt her hog and felt her sag, betted when she'd break;
Wondered every time she raced if she'd stand the shock;
Heard the seas like drunken men pounding at her strake;
Hoped the Lord 'ud keep his thumb on the plummer-block.
Banged against the iron decks, bilges choked with coal;
Flayed and frozen foot and hand, sick of heart and soul;
Last we prayed she'd buck herself into judgment Day--
Hi! we cursed the Bolivar--knocking round the Bay!
O her nose flung up to sky, groaning to be still--
Up and down and back we went, never time for breath;
Then the money paid at Lloyd's caught her by the heel,
And the stars ran round and round dancin' at our death.
Aching for an hour's sleep, dozing off between;
'Heard the rotten rivets draw when she took it green;
'Watched the compass chase its tail like a cat at play--
That was on the Bolivar, south across the Bay.
Once we saw between the squalls, lyin' head to swell--
Mad with work and weariness, wishin' they was we--
Some damned Liner's lights go by like a long hotel;
Cheered her from the Bolivar--swampin' in the sea.
Then a grayback cleared us out, then the skipper laughed;
"Boys, the wheel has gone to Hell--rig the winches aft!
Yoke the kicking rudder-head--get her under way!"
So we steered her, pulley-haul, out across the Bay!
Just a pack o' rotten plates puttied up with tar,
In we came, an' time enough, 'cross Bilbao Bar.
Overloaded, undermanned, meant to founder, we
Euchred God Almighty's storm, bluffed the Eternal Sea!
Seven men from all the world, back to town again,
Rollin' down the Ratcliffe Road drunk and raising Cain:
Seven men from out of Hell.  Ain't the owners gay,
'Cause we took the "Bolivar" safe across the Bay?
Above the portico a flag-staff, bearing the Union Jack,
remained fluttering in the flames for some time, but ultimately
when it fell the crowds rent the air with shouts,
and seemed to see significance in the incident.--DAILY PAPERS.
The poor little street-bred people that vapour and fume and brag,
Must we borrow a clout from the Boer--to plaster anew with dirt?
An Irish liar's bandage, or an English coward's shirt?
We may not speak of England; her Flag's to sell or share.
What is the Flag of England?  Winds of the World, declare!
The North Wind blew:--"From Bergen my steel-shod vanguards go;
I chase your lazy whalers home from the Disko floe;
By the great North Lights above me I work the will of God,
"I barred my gates with iron, I shuttered my doors with flame,
Because to force my ramparts your nutshell navies came;
"The lean white bear hath seen it in the long, long Arctic night,
What is the Flag of England?  Ye have but my bergs to dare,
Ye have but my drifts to conquer.  Go forth, for it is there!"
"Strayed amid lonely islets, mazed amid outer keys,
I waked the palms to laughter--I tossed the scud in the breeze--
Never was isle so little, never was sea so lone,
But over the scud and the palm-trees an English flag was flown.
"My basking sunfish know it, and wheeling albatross,
Where the lone wave fills with fire beneath the Southern Cross.
What is the Flag of England?  Ye have but my reefs to dare,
Ye have but my seas to furrow.  Go forth, for it is there!"
"The reeling junks behind me and the racing seas before,
I raped your richest roadstead--I plundered Singapore!
I set my hand on the Hoogli; as a hooded snake she rose,
"Never the lotus closes, never the wild-fowl wake,
Because on the bones of the English the English Flag is stayed.
"The desert-dust hath dimmed it, the flying wild-ass knows,
The scared white leopard winds it across the taintless snows.
What is the Flag of England?  Ye have but my sun to dare,
Ye have but my sands to travel.  Go forth, for it is there!"
The West Wind called:--"In squadrons the thoughtless galleons fly
They make my might their porter, they make my house their path,
"I draw the gliding fog-bank as a snake is drawn from the hole,
They bellow one to the other, the frighted ship-bells toll,
"But whether in calm or wrack-wreath, whether by dark or day,
I heave them whole to the conger or rip their plates away,
First of the scattered legions, under a shrieking sky,
Dipping between the rollers, the English Flag goes by.
What is the Flag of England?  Ye have but my breath to dare,
Ye have but my waves to conquer.  Go forth, for it is there!"
Help for a patriot distressed, a spotless spirit hurt,
Help for an honorable clan sore trampled in the dirt!
From Queenstown Bay to Donegal, O listen to my song,
The honorable gentlemen have suffered grievous wrong.
Their noble names were mentioned--O the burning black disgrace!--
Cleared in the face of all mankind beneath the winking skies,
Like phoenixes from Phoenix Park (and what lay there) they rise!
Go shout it to the emerald seas-give word to Erin now,
Her honorable gentlemen are cleared--and this is how:
They only paid the Moonlighter his cattle-hocking price,
They only helped the murderer with council's best advice,
But--sure it keeps their honor white--the learned Court believes
They never gave a piece of plate to murderers and thieves.
They ever told the ramping crowd to card a woman's hide,
By God, the boys that did the work were braver men than they!
They knew whom they were talking at, if they were Irish too,
The gentlemen that lied in Court, they knew and well they knew.
They only took the Judas-gold from Fenians out of jail,
They only fawned for dollars on the blood-dyed Clan-na-Gael.
"Cleared," honorable gentlemen.  Be thankful it's no more:
The widow's curse is on your house, the dead are at your door.
On you the shame of open shame, on you from North to South
The band of every honest man flat-heeled across your mouth.
It's sticking to your fist today for all your sneer and scoff,
And by the Judge's well-weighed word you cannot wipe it off.
Hold up those hands of innocence--go, scare your sheep, together,
Tell them it's tar that glistens so, and daub them yours again!
"The charge is old"?--As old as Cain--as fresh as yesterday;
Old as the Ten Commandments, have ye talked those laws away?
If words are words, or death is death, or powder sends the ball,
You spoke the words that sped the shot--the curse be on you all.
"Our friends believe"? Of course they do--as sheltered women may;
The secret half a country keeps, the whisper in the lane,
The shriek that tells the shot went home behind the broken pane,
The dry blood crisping in the sun that scares the honest bees,
But you--you know--ay, ten times more; the secrets of the dead,
Black terror on the country-side by word and whisper bred,
My soul!  I'd sooner lie in jail for murder plain and straight,
Pure crime I'd done with my own hand for money, lust, or hate,
Than take a seat in Parliament by fellow-felons cheered,
The other on your dress-shirt front to show your heart is @dane,
If print is print or words are words, the learned Court perpends:
Now this is the tale of the Council the German Kaiser decreed,
The paper lay on the table, the strong heads bowed thereby,
And each one heard Her laughing as each one saw Her plain--
"There's a girl in Jersey City who works on the telephone;
We're going to hitch our horses and dig for a house of our own,
And over the German benches the bearded whisper ran:--
"Lager, der girls und der dollars, dey makes or dey breaks a man.
They passed one resolution:--"Your sub-committee believe
Now this is the tale of the Council the German Kaiser held--
Now Tomlinson gave up the ghost in his house in Berkeley Square,
And a Spirit came to his bedside and gripped him by the hair--
A Spirit gripped him by the hair and carried him far away,
"Stand up, stand up now, Tomlinson, and answer loud and high
The good that ye did for the sake of men or ever ye came to die--
--"For that ye strove in neighbour-love it shall be written fair,
For the race is run by one and one and never by two and two."
Then Tomlinson looked up and down, and little gain was there,
And Tomlinson took up his tale and spoke of his good in life.
"This I have read in a book," he said, "and that was told to me,
There's little room between the stars in idleness to prate!
O none may reach by hired speech of neighbour, priest, and kin
The Spirit gripped him by the hair, and sun by sun they fell
"Wot ye the price of good pit-coal that I must pay?" said he,
"That ye rank yoursel' so fit for Hell and ask no leave of me?
I am all o'er-sib to Adam's breed that ye should give me scorn,
"Sit down, sit down upon the slag, and answer loud and high
The harm that ye did to the Sons of Men or ever you came to die."
The belly of a tortured star blood-red in Hell-Mouth light;
And Tomlinson looked down and down, and saw beneath his feet
The frontlet of a tortured star milk-white in Hell-Mouth heat.
"O I had a love on earth," said he, "that kissed me to my fall,
And if ye would call my love to me I know she would answer all."
--"All that ye did in love forbid it shall be written fair,
But now ye wait at Hell-Mouth Gate and not in Berkeley Square:
The Wind that blows between the worlds, it cut him like a knife,
And Tomlinson took up the tale and spoke of his sin in life:--
Then Tomlinson he gripped the bars and yammered, "Let me in--
There's sore decline in Adam's line if this be spawn of earth."
Empusa's crew, so naked-new they may not face the fire,
As children rifle a caddis-case or the raven's foolish hoard.
"Yet close we lie, and deep we lie, and if I gave him place,
My gentlemen that are so proud would flout me to my face;
They'd call my house a common stews and me a careless host,
And for that sin should ye come in were I the lord alone.
But sinful pride has rule inside--and mightier than my own.
"I'm all o'er-sib to Adam's breed that I should mock your pain,
But look that ye win to worthier sin ere ye come back again.
And carry my word to the Sons of Men or ever ye come to die:
I have made for you a song,
And it may be right or wrong,
But only you can tell me if it's true;
I have tried for to explain
Both your pleasure and your pain,
And, Thomas, here's my best respects to you!
O there'll surely come a day
When they'll give you all your pay,
And treat you as a Christian ought to do;
So, until that day comes round,
Heaven keep you safe and sound,
And, Thomas, here's my best respects to you!
"What are the bugles blowin' for?" said Files-on-Parade.
"To turn you out, to turn you out", the Colour-Sergeant said.
"What makes you look so white, so white?" said Files-on-Parade.
"I'm dreadin' what I've got to watch", the Colour-Sergeant said.
They've taken of his buttons off an' cut his stripes away,
An' they're hangin' Danny Deever in the mornin'.
"What makes the rear-rank breathe so 'ard?" said Files-on-Parade.
"It's bitter cold, it's bitter cold", the Colour-Sergeant said.
"What makes that front-rank man fall down?" said Files-on-Parade.
"A touch o' sun, a touch o' sun", the Colour-Sergeant said.
They are hangin' Danny Deever, they are marchin' of 'im round,
They 'ave 'alted Danny Deever by 'is coffin on the ground;
An' 'e'll swing in 'arf a minute for a sneakin' shootin' hound--
O they're hangin' Danny Deever in the mornin'!
"'Is cot was right-'and cot to mine", said Files-on-Parade.
"'E's sleepin' out an' far tonight", the Colour-Sergeant said.
"I've drunk 'is beer a score o' times", said Files-on-Parade.
"'E's drinkin' bitter beer alone", the Colour-Sergeant said.
They are hangin' Danny Deever, you must mark 'im to 'is place,
For 'e shot a comrade sleepin'--you must look 'im in the face;
Nine 'undred of 'is county an' the regiment's disgrace,
While they're hangin' Danny Deever in the mornin'.
"What's that so black agin' the sun?" said Files-on-Parade.
"It's Danny fightin' 'ard for life", the Colour-Sergeant said.
"What's that that whimpers over'ead?" said Files-on-Parade.
"It's Danny's soul that's passin' now", the Colour-Sergeant said.
I went into a public-'ouse to get a pint o' beer,
The publican 'e up an' sez, "We serve no red-coats here."
The girls be'ind the bar they laughed an' giggled fit to die,
I outs into the street again an' to myself sez I:
O it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' "Tommy, go away";
O it's "Thank you, Mister Atkins", when the band begins to play.
I went into a theatre as sober as could be,
They gave a drunk civilian room, but 'adn't none for me;
They sent me to the gallery or round the music-'alls,
Yes, makin' mock o' uniforms that guard you while you sleep
Is cheaper than them uniforms, an' they're starvation cheap;
An' hustlin' drunken soldiers when they're goin' large a bit
Is five times better business than paradin' in full kit.
The drums begin to roll, my boys, the drums begin to roll,
O it's "Thin red line of 'eroes" when the drums begin to roll.
We aren't no thin red 'eroes, nor we aren't no blackguards too,
But single men in barricks, most remarkable like you;
An' if sometimes our conduck isn't all your fancy paints,
Why, single men in barricks don't grow into plaster saints;
While it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' "Tommy, fall be'ind",
You talk o' better food for us, an' schools, an' fires, an' all:
We'll wait for extry rations if you treat us rational.
Don't mess about the cook-room slops, but prove it to our face
The Widow's Uniform is not the soldier-man's disgrace.
An' it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' anything you please;
An' Tommy ain't a bloomin' fool--you bet that Tommy sees!
We've fought with many men acrost the seas,
An' some of 'em was brave an' some was not:
But the Fuzzy was the finest o' the lot.
We never got a ha'porth's change of 'im:
'E squatted in the scrub an' 'ocked our 'orses,
'E cut our sentries up at Suakim,
An' 'e played the cat an' banjo with our forces.
So 'ere's to you, Fuzzy-Wuzzy, at your 'ome in the Soudan;
You're a pore benighted 'eathen but a first-class fightin' man;
We gives you your certificate, an' if you want it signed
We'll come an' 'ave a romp with you whenever you're inclined.
We took our chanst among the Khyber 'ills,
The Boers knocked us silly at a mile,
The Burman give us Irriwaddy chills,
An' a Zulu impi dished us up in style:
But all we ever got from such as they
Was pop to what the Fuzzy made us swaller;
We 'eld our bloomin' own, the papers say,
But man for man the Fuzzy knocked us 'oller.
Then 'ere's to you, Fuzzy-Wuzzy, an' the missis and the kid;
Our orders was to break you, an' of course we went an' did.
We sloshed you with Martinis, an' it wasn't 'ardly fair;
But for all the odds agin' you, Fuzzy-Wuz, you broke the square.
'E 'asn't got no papers of 'is own,
'E 'asn't got no medals nor rewards,
So we must certify the skill 'e's shown
In usin' of 'is long two-'anded swords:
When 'e's 'oppin' in an' out among the bush
With 'is coffin-'eaded shield an' shovel-spear,
An 'appy day with Fuzzy on the rush
Will last an 'ealthy Tommy for a year.
But give an' take's the gospel, an' we'll call the bargain fair,
For if you 'ave lost more than us, you crumpled up the square!
'E rushes at the smoke when we let drive,
An', before we know, 'e's 'ackin' at our 'ead;
'E's all 'ot sand an' ginger when alive,
An' 'e's generally shammin' when 'e's dead.
'E's a daisy, 'e's a ducky, 'e's a lamb!
'E's the on'y thing that doesn't give a damn
So 'ere's to you, Fuzzy-Wuzzy, at your 'ome in the Soudan;
You're a pore benighted 'eathen but a first-class fightin' man;
An' 'ere's to you, Fuzzy-Wuzzy, with your 'ayrick 'ead of 'air--
You big black boundin' beggar--for you broke a British square!
"Soldier, soldier come from the wars,
Why don't you march with my true love?"
"We're fresh from off the ship an' 'e's maybe give the slip,
An' you'd best go look for a new love."
New love!  True love!
Best go look for a new love,
The dead they cannot rise, an' you'd better dry your eyes,
An' you'd best go look for a new love.
"Soldier, soldier come from the wars,
What did you see o' my true love?"
"I seed 'im serve the Queen in a suit o' rifle-green,
An' you'd best go look for a new love."
"Soldier, soldier come from the wars,
Did ye see no more o' my true love?"
"I seed 'im runnin' by when the shots begun to fly--
But you'd best go look for a new love."
"Soldier, soldier come from the wars,
Did aught take 'arm to my true love?"
"I couldn't see the fight, for the smoke it lay so white--
An' you'd best go look for a new love."
"Soldier, soldier come from the wars,
I'll up an' tend to my true love!"
"'E's lying on the dead with a bullet through 'is 'ead,
An' you'd best go look for a new love."
"Soldier, soldier come from the wars,
I'll down an' die with my true love!"
"The pit we dug'll 'ide 'im an' the twenty men beside 'im--
An' you'd best go look for a new love."
"Soldier, soldier come from the wars,
Do you bring no sign from my true love?"
"I bring a lock of 'air that 'e allus used to wear,
An' you'd best go look for a new love."
"Soldier, soldier come from the wars,
O then I know it's true I've lost my true love!"
"An' I tell you truth again--when you've lost the feel o' pain
You'd best take me for your true love."
True love!  New love!
Best take 'im for a new love,
The dead they cannot rise, an' you'd better dry your eyes,
An' you'd best take 'im for your true love.
Smokin' my pipe on the mountings,
sniffin' the mornin' cool,
I walks in my old brown gaiters
along o' my old brown mule,
With seventy gunners be'ind me,
an' never a beggar forgets
It's only the pick of the Army
that handles the dear little pets--'Tss! 'Tss!
o' course you will know what to do--hoo! hoo!
Jest send in your Chief an' surrender--
it's worse if you fights or you runs:
You can go where you please, you can skid up the trees,
but you don't get away from the guns!
we've give the Afreedeeman fits,
For we fancies ourselves at two thousand,
we guns that are built in two bits--'Tss! 'Tss!
For you all love the screw-guns . . .
If a man doesn't work, why, we drills 'im
an' teaches 'im 'ow to behave;
If a beggar can't march, why, we kills 'im
an' rattles 'im into 'is grave.
You've got to stand up to our business
an' spring without snatchin' or fuss.
D'you say that you sweat with the field-guns?
By God, you must lather with us--'Tss! 'Tss!
For you all love the screw-guns . . .
The eagles is screamin' around us,
the river's a-moanin' below,
We're clear o' the pine an' the oak-scrub,
we're out on the rocks an' the snow,
An' the wind is as thin as a whip-lash
what carries away to the plains
The rattle an' stamp o' the lead-mules--
the jinglety-jink o' the chains--'Tss! 'Tss!
For you all love the screw-guns . . .
There's a wheel on the Horns o' the Mornin',
an' a wheel on the edge o' the Pit,
an' the sun off the snow in your face,
An' 'arf o' the men on the drag-ropes
to hold the old gun in 'er place--'Tss! 'Tss!
For you all love the screw-guns . . .
Smokin' my pipe on the mountings,
sniffin' the mornin' cool,
I climbs in my old brown gaiters
along o' my old brown mule.
The monkey can say what our road was--
the wild-goat 'e knows where we passed.
Stand easy, you long-eared old darlin's!
Out drag-ropes!  With shrapnel!  Hold fast--'Tss! 'Tss!
For you all love the screw-guns--the screw-guns they all love
So when we take tea with a few guns,
o' course you will know what to do--hoo! hoo!
Jest send in your Chief an' surrender--
it's worse if you fights or you runs:
You may hide in the caves, they'll be only your graves,
but you can't get away from the guns!
You may talk o' gin and beer
When you're quartered safe out 'ere,
An' you're sent to penny-fights an' Aldershot it;
But when it comes to slaughter
You will do your work on water,
An' you'll lick the bloomin' boots of 'im that's got it.
Now in Injia's sunny clime,
Where I used to spend my time
A-servin' of 'Er Majesty the Queen,
Of all them blackfaced crew
The finest man I knew
Was our regimental bhisti, Gunga Din.
You limpin' lump o' brick-dust, Gunga Din!
Hi! slippy hitherao!
You squidgy-nosed old idol, Gunga Din."
The uniform 'e wore
Was nothin' much before,
An' rather less than 'arf o' that be'ind,
For a piece o' twisty rag
An' a goatskin water-bag
Was all the field-equipment 'e could find.
When the sweatin' troop-train lay
In a sidin' through the day,
Where the 'eat would make your bloomin' eyebrows crawl,
Till our throats were bricky-dry,
You 'eathen, where the mischief 'ave you been?
You put some juldee 3 in it
Or I'll marrow 4 you this minute
If you don't fill up my helmet, Gunga Din!"
'E would dot an' carry one
Till the longest day was done;
An' 'e didn't seem to know the use o' fear.
If we charged or broke or cut,
You could bet your bloomin' nut,
'E'd be waitin' fifty paces right flank rear.
With 'is mussick 5 on 'is back,
'E would skip with our attack,
An' watch us till the bugles made "Retire",
An' for all 'is dirty 'ide
'E was white, clear white, inside
When 'e went to tend the wounded under fire!
With the bullets kickin' dust-spots on the green.
When the cartridges ran out,
You could hear the front-files shout,
"Hi! ammunition-mules an' Gunga Din!"
I shan't forgit the night
When I dropped be'ind the fight
With a bullet where my belt-plate should 'a' been.
I was chokin' mad with thirst,
An' the man that spied me first
Was our good old grinnin', gruntin' Gunga Din.
'E lifted up my 'ead,
An' he plugged me where I bled,
An' 'e guv me 'arf-a-pint o' water-green:
It was crawlin' and it stunk,
But of all the drinks I've drunk,
I'm gratefullest to one from Gunga Din.
'Ere's a beggar with a bullet through 'is spleen;
'E's chawin' up the ground,
An' 'e's kickin' all around:
For Gawd's sake git the water, Gunga Din!"
'E carried me away
To where a dooli lay,
An' a bullet come an' drilled the beggar clean.
'E put me safe inside,
An' just before 'e died,
"I 'ope you liked your drink", sez Gunga Din.
So I'll meet 'im later on
At the place where 'e is gone--
Where it's always double drill and no canteen;
'E'll be squattin' on the coals
Givin' drink to poor damned souls,
An' I'll get a swig in hell from Gunga Din!
You Lazarushian-leather Gunga Din!
Though I've belted you and flayed you,
By the livin' Gawd that made you,
You're a better man than I am, Gunga Din!
But it's everlastin' waitin' on a everlastin' road
For the commissariat camel an' 'is commissariat load.
O the oont, 1 O the oont, O the commissariat oont!
With 'is silly neck a-bobbin' like a basket full o' snakes;
We packs 'im like an idol, an' you ought to 'ear 'im grunt,
An' when we gets 'im loaded up 'is blessed girth-rope breaks.
Wot makes the rear-guard swear so 'ard when night is drorin' in,
An' every native follower is shiverin' for 'is skin?
It ain't the chanst o' being rushed by Paythans from the 'ills,
It's the commissariat camel puttin' on 'is bloomin' frills!
O the oont, O the oont, O the hairy scary oont!
A-trippin' over tent-ropes when we've got the night alarm!
We socks 'im with a stretcher-pole an' 'eads 'im off in front,
An' when we've saved 'is bloomin' life 'e chaws our bloomin' arm.
The 'orse 'e knows above a bit, the bullock's but a fool,
The elephant's a gentleman, the battery-mule's a mule;
But the commissariat cam-u-el, when all is said an' done,
'E's a devil an' a ostrich an' a orphan-child in one.
O the oont, O the oont, O the Gawd-forsaken oont!
The lumpy-'umpy 'ummin'-bird a-singin' where 'e lies,
'E's blocked the whole division from the rear-guard to the front,
O the oont, O the oont, O the floppin', droppin' oont!
When 'is long legs give from under an' 'is meltin' eye is dim,
The tribes is up be'ind us, and the tribes is out in front--
It ain't no jam for Tommy, but it's kites an' crows for 'im.
So when the cruel march is done, an' when the roads is blind,
An' when we sees the camp in front an' 'ears the shots be'ind,
Ho! then we strips 'is saddle off, and all 'is woes is past:
'E thinks on us that used 'im so, and gets revenge at last.
O the oont, O the oont, O the floatin', bloatin' oont!
The late lamented camel in the water-cut 'e lies;
We keeps a mile be'ind 'im an' we keeps a mile in front,
But 'e gets into the drinkin'-casks, and then o' course we dies.
rhyme with "front."
If you've ever stole a pheasant-egg be'ind the keeper's back,
If you've ever snigged the washin' from the line,
If you've ever crammed a gander in your bloomin' 'aversack,
You will understand this little song o' mine.
But the service rules are 'ard, an' from such we are debarred,
For the same with English morals does not suit.
(Cornet:  Toot! toot!)
W'y, they call a man a robber if 'e stuffs 'is marchin' clobber
With the--
(Chorus)  Loo! loo!  Lulu! lulu!  Loo! loo!  Loot! loot! loot!
Ow the loot!
Bloomin' loot!
That's the thing to make the boys git up an' shoot!
It's the same with dogs an' men,
If you'd make 'em come again
Clap 'em forward with a Loo! loo! Lulu! Loot!
An' may thank your stars an' gaiters if you didn't feel 'is knife
Why lootin' should be entered as a crime;
So if my song you'll 'ear, I will learn you plain an' clear
'Ow to pay yourself for fightin' overtime.
(Chorus)  With the loot, . . .
Now remember when you're 'acking round a gilded Burma god
That 'is eyes is very often precious stones;
'E's like to show you everything 'e owns.
When 'e won't prodooce no more, pour some water on the floor
Where you 'ear it answer 'ollow to the boot
(Chorus)  Loo! loo!  Lulu!   Loot! loot! loot!
Ow the loot! . . .
For a single man gets bottled on them twisty-wisty stairs,
An' a woman comes and clobs 'im from be'ind.
When you've turned 'em inside out, an' it seems beyond a doubt
As if there weren't enough to dust a flute
Before you sling your 'ook, at the 'ousetops take a look,
For it's underneath the tiles they 'ide the loot.
(Chorus)  Ow the loot! . . .
You can mostly square a Sergint an' a Quartermaster too,
If you only take the proper way to go;
I could never keep my pickin's, but I've learned you all I knew--
An' now I'll bid good-bye, for I'm gettin' rather dry,
An' I see another tunin' up to toot
So 'ere's good-luck to those that wears the Widow's clo'es,
An' the Devil send 'em all they want o' loot!
(Chorus)     Yes, the loot,
Bloomin' loot!
In the tunic an' the mess-tin an' the boot!
It's the same with dogs an' men,
If you'd make 'em come again
This 'appened in a battle to a batt'ry of the corps
Which is first among the women an' amazin' first in war;
An' what the bloomin' battle was I don't remember now,
But Two's off-lead 'e answered to the name o' Snarleyow.
Down in the Infantry, nobody cares;
Down in the Cavalry, Colonel 'e swears;
But down in the lead with the wheel at the flog
Turns the bold Bombardier to a little whipped dog!
They was movin' into action, they was needed very sore,
To learn a little schoolin' to a native army corps,
They cut 'im loose an' left 'im--'e was almost tore in two--
But he tried to follow after as a well-trained 'orse should do;
'E went an' fouled the limber, an' the Driver's Brother squeals:
"Pull up, pull up for Snarleyow--'is head's between 'is 'eels!"
The Driver 'umped 'is shoulder, for the wheels was goin' round,
'E 'adn't 'ardly spoke the word, before a droppin' shell
A little right the batt'ry an' between the sections fell;
An' when the smoke 'ad cleared away, before the limber wheels,
There lay the Driver's Brother with 'is 'ead between 'is 'eels.
Then sez the Driver's Brother, an' 'is words was very plain,
"For Gawd's own sake get over me, an' put me out o' pain."
The Driver 'e give nothin' 'cept a little coughin' grunt,
But 'e swung 'is 'orses 'andsome when it came to "Action Front!"
An' if one wheel was juicy, you may lay your Monday head
The moril of this story, it is plainly to be seen:
You 'avn't got no families when servin' of the Queen--
You 'avn't got no brothers, fathers, sisters, wives, or sons--
If you want to win your battles take an' work your bloomin' guns!
Down in the Infantry, nobody cares;
Down in the Cavalry, Colonel 'e swears;
But down in the lead with the wheel at the flog
Turns the bold Bombardier to a little whipped dog!
'Ave you 'eard o' the Widow at Windsor
With a hairy gold crown on 'er 'ead?
She 'as ships on the foam--she 'as millions at 'ome,
An' she pays us poor beggars in red.
(Ow, poor beggars in red!)
There's 'er nick on the cavalry 'orses,
There's 'er mark on the medical stores--
An' 'er troopers you'll find with a fair wind be'ind
That takes us to various wars.
(Poor beggars!--barbarious wars!)
Then 'ere's to the Widow at Windsor,
An' 'ere's to the stores an' the guns,
The men an' the 'orses what makes up the forces
O' Missis Victorier's sons.
(Poor beggars! Victorier's sons!)
Walk wide o' the Widow at Windsor,
For 'alf o' Creation she owns:
We 'ave bought 'er the same with the sword an' the flame,
An' we've salted it down with our bones.
(Poor beggars!--it's blue with our bones!)
Hands off o' the sons o' the Widow,
Hands off o' the goods in 'er shop,
For the Kings must come down an' the Emperors frown
When the Widow at Windsor says "Stop"!
(Poor beggars!--we're sent to say "Stop"!)
Then 'ere's to the Lodge o' the Widow,
From the Pole to the Tropics it runs--
To the Lodge that we tile with the rank an' the file,
An' open in form with the guns.
(Poor beggars!--it's always they guns!)
We 'ave 'eard o' the Widow at Windsor,
It's safest to let 'er alone:
For 'er sentries we stand by the sea an' the land
Wherever the bugles are blown.
(Poor beggars!--an' don't we get blown!)
Take 'old o' the Wings o' the Mornin',
An' flop round the earth till you're dead;
But you won't get away from the tune that they play
To the bloomin' old rag over'ead.
Then 'ere's to the sons o' the Widow,
Wherever, 'owever they roam.
'Ere's all they desire, an' if they require
A speedy return to their 'ome.
(Poor beggars!--they'll never see 'ome!)
There was a row in Silver Street that's near to Dublin Quay,
Between an Irish regiment an' English cavalree;
It started at Revelly an' it lasted on till dark:
The first man dropped at Harrison's, the last forninst the Park.
For it was:--"Belts, belts, belts, an' that's one for you!"
An' it was "Belts, belts, belts, an' that's done for you!"
O buckle an' tongue
Was the song that we sung
From Harrison's down to the Park!
There was a row in Silver Street--the regiments was out,
They called us "Delhi Rebels", an' we answered "Threes about!"
That drew them like a hornet's nest--we met them good an' large,
The English at the double an' the Irish at the charge.
There was a row in Silver Street--an' I was in it too;
We passed the time o' day, an' then the belts went whirraru!
I misremember what occurred, but subsequint the storm
A Freeman's Journal Supplemint was all my uniform.
There was a row in Silver Street--they sent the Polis there,
The English were too drunk to know, the Irish didn't care;
But when they grew impertinint we simultaneous rose,
Till half o' them was Liffey mud an' half was tatthered clo'es.
There was a row in Silver Street--it might ha' raged till now,
But some one drew his side-arm clear, an' nobody knew how;
'Twas Hogan took the point an' dropped; we saw the red blood run:
There was a row in Silver Street--but that put down the shine,
Wid each man whisperin' to his next: "'Twas never work o' mine!"
We went away like beaten dogs, an' down the street we bore him,
There was a row in Silver Street--it isn't over yet,
For half of us are under guard wid punishments to get;
'Tis all a merricle to me as in the Clink I lie:
There was a row in Silver Street--begod, I wonder why!
But it was:--"Belts, belts, belts, an' that's one for you!"
An' it was "Belts, belts, belts, an' that's done for you!"
O buckle an' tongue
Was the song that we sung
From Harrison's down to the Park!
When the 'arf-made recruity goes out to the East
'E acts like a babe an' 'e drinks like a beast,
An' 'e wonders because 'e is frequent deceased
Ere 'e's fit for to serve as a soldier.
Serve, serve, serve as a soldier,
Serve, serve, serve as a soldier,
Serve, serve, serve as a soldier,
So-oldier of the Queen!
Now all you recruities what's drafted today,
You shut up your rag-box an' 'ark to my lay,
An' I'll sing you a soldier as far as I may:
A soldier what's fit for a soldier.
Fit, fit, fit for a soldier . . .
First mind you steer clear o' the grog-sellers' huts,
For they sell you Fixed Bay'nets that rots out your guts--
Ay, drink that 'ud eat the live steel from your butts--
An' it's bad for the young British soldier.
Bad, bad, bad for the soldier . . .
When the cholera comes--as it will past a doubt--
Keep out of the wet and don't go on the shout,
For the sickness gets in as the liquor dies out,
An' it crumples the young British soldier.
Crum-, crum-, crumples the soldier . . .
But the worst o' your foes is the sun over'ead:
You must wear your 'elmet for all that is said:
If 'e finds you uncovered 'e'll knock you down dead,
An' you'll die like a fool of a soldier.
Fool, fool, fool of a soldier . . .
If you're cast for fatigue by a sergeant unkind,
Don't grouse like a woman nor crack on nor blind;
Be handy and civil, and then you will find
That it's beer for the young British soldier.
Beer, beer, beer for the soldier . . .
Now, if you must marry, take care she is old--
A troop-sergeant's widow's the nicest I'm told,
For beauty won't help if your rations is cold,
Nor love ain't enough for a soldier.
'Nough, 'nough, 'nough for a soldier . . .
If the wife should go wrong with a comrade, be loath
To shoot when you catch 'em--you'll swing, on my oath!--
Make 'im take 'er and keep 'er:  that's Hell for them both,
An' you're shut o' the curse of a soldier.
Curse, curse, curse of a soldier . . .
When first under fire an' you're wishful to duck,
Don't look nor take 'eed at the man that is struck,
Be thankful you're livin', and trust to your luck
And march to your front like a soldier.
Front, front, front like a soldier . . .
When 'arf of your bullets fly wide in the ditch,
She's human as you are--you treat her as sich,
An' she'll fight for the young British soldier.
Fight, fight, fight for the soldier . . .
When shakin' their bustles like ladies so fine,
The guns o' the enemy wheel into line,
Shoot low at the limbers an' don't mind the shine,
For noise never startles the soldier.
Start-, start-, startles the soldier . . .
If your officer's dead and the sergeants look white,
Remember it's ruin to run from a fight:
So take open order, lie down, and sit tight,
And wait for supports like a soldier.
Wait, wait, wait like a soldier . . .
When you're wounded and left on Afghanistan's plains,
And the women come out to cut up what remains,
Jest roll to your rifle and blow out your brains
An' go to your Gawd like a soldier.
Go, go, go like a soldier,
Go, go, go like a soldier,
Go, go, go like a soldier,
So-oldier of the Queen!
By the old Moulmein Pagoda, lookin' lazy at the sea,
There's a Burma girl a-settin', and I know she thinks o' me;
For the wind is in the palm-trees, and the temple-bells they say:
Come you back to Mandalay,
Where the old Flotilla lay:
Can't you 'ear their paddles chunkin' from Rangoon to Mandalay?
On the road to Mandalay,
Where the flyin'-fishes play,
An' the dawn comes up like thunder outer China 'crost the Bay!
'Er petticoat was yaller an' 'er little cap was green,
An' 'er name was Supi-yaw-lat--jes' the same as Theebaw's Queen,
An' I seed her first a-smokin' of a whackin' white cheroot,
An' a-wastin' Christian kisses on an 'eathen idol's foot:
Bloomin' idol made o'mud--
Wot they called the Great Gawd Budd--
Plucky lot she cared for idols when I kissed 'er where she stud!
On the road to Mandalay . . .
With 'er arm upon my shoulder an' 'er cheek agin' my cheek
We useter watch the steamers an' the hathis pilin' teak.
Elephints a-pilin' teak
In the sludgy, squdgy creek,
Where the silence 'ung that 'eavy you was 'arf afraid to speak!
On the road to Mandalay . . .
But that's all shove be'ind me--long ago an' fur away,
An' there ain't no 'busses runnin' from the Bank to Mandalay;
An' I'm learnin' 'ere in London what the ten-year soldier tells:
But them spicy garlic smells,
An' the sunshine an' the palm-trees an' the tinkly temple-bells;
On the road to Mandalay . . .
I am sick o' wastin' leather on these gritty pavin'-stones,
An' the blasted Henglish drizzle wakes the fever in my bones;
Tho' I walks with fifty 'ousemaids outer Chelsea to the Strand,
An' they talks a lot o' lovin', but wot do they understand?
Beefy face an' grubby 'and--
Law! wot do they understand?
I've a neater, sweeter maiden in a cleaner, greener land!
On the road to Mandalay . . .
On the road to Mandalay,
Where the old Flotilla lay,
With our sick beneath the awnings when we went to Mandalay!
On the road to Mandalay,
Where the flyin'-fishes play,
An' the dawn comes up like thunder outer China 'crost the Bay!
Troopin', troopin', troopin' to the sea:
'Ere's September come again--the six-year men are free.
O leave the dead be'ind us, for they cannot come away
To where the ship's a-coalin' up that takes us 'ome today.
We're goin' 'ome, we're goin' 'ome,
Our ship is at the shore,
An' you must pack your 'aversack,
For we won't come back no more.
Ho, don't you grieve for me,
My lovely Mary-Ann,
For I'll marry you yit on a fourp'ny bit
As a time-expired man.
The Malabar's in 'arbour with the Jumner at 'er tail,
An' the time-expired's waitin' of 'is orders for to sail.
Ho! the weary waitin' when on Khyber 'ills we lay,
But the time-expired's waitin' of 'is orders 'ome today.
They'll turn us out at Portsmouth wharf in cold an' wet an' rain,
They'll kill us of pneumonia--for that's their little way--
But damn the chills and fever, men, we're goin' 'ome today!
Troopin', troopin', winter's round again!
See the new draf's pourin' in for the old campaign;
Ho, you poor recruities, but you've got to earn your pay--
What's the last from Lunnon, lads?  We're goin' there today.
Troopin', troopin', give another cheer--
'Ere's to English women an' a quart of English beer.
The Colonel an' the regiment an' all who've got to stay,
Gawd's mercy strike 'em gentle--Whoop! we're goin' 'ome today.
We're goin' 'ome, we're goin' 'ome,
Our ship is at the shore,
An' you must pack your 'aversack,
For we won't come back no more.
Ho, don't you grieve for me,
My lovely Mary-Ann,
For I'll marry you yit on a fourp'ny bit
As a time-expired man.
Kabul town's by Kabul river--
Blow the bugle, draw the sword--
There I lef' my mate for ever,
Wet an' drippin' by the ford.
Ford, ford, ford o' Kabul river,
Ford o' Kabul river in the dark!
Kabul town's a blasted place--
Blow the bugle, draw the sword--
'Strewth I sha'n't forget 'is face
Wet an' drippin' by the ford!
Ford, ford, ford o' Kabul river,
Ford o' Kabul river in the dark!
Kabul town is sun and dust--
Blow the bugle, draw the sword--
I'd ha' sooner drownded fust
'Stead of 'im beside the ford.
Ford, ford, ford o' Kabul river,
Ford o' Kabul river in the dark!
Kabul town was ours to take--
Blow the bugle, draw the sword--
I'd ha' left it for 'is sake--
'Im that left me by the ford.
Ford, ford, ford o' Kabul river,
Ford o' Kabul river in the dark!
Kabul town'll go to hell--
Blow the bugle, draw the sword--
'Fore I see him 'live an' well--
'Im the best beside the ford.
Ford, ford, ford o' Kabul river,
Ford o' Kabul river in the dark!
Gawd 'elp 'em if they blunder, for their boots'll pull 'em under,
Turn your 'orse from Kabul town--
Blow the bugle, draw the sword--
'Im an' 'arf my troop is down,
Down an' drownded by the ford.
Ford, ford, ford o' Kabul river,
Ford o' Kabul river in the dark!
There's the river low an' fallin', but it ain't no use o' callin'
We're marchin' on relief over Injia's sunny plains,
A little front o' Christmas-time an' just be'ind the Rains;
Ho! get away you bullock-man, you've 'eard the bugle blowed,
There's a regiment a-comin' down the Grand Trunk Road;
With its best foot first
And the road a-sliding past,
An' every bloomin' campin'-ground exactly like the last;
While the Big Drum says,
Oh, there's them Injian temples to admire when you see,
There's the peacock round the corner an' the monkey up the tree,
An' there's that rummy silver grass a-wavin' in the wind,
An' the old Grand Trunk a-trailin' like a rifle-sling be'ind.
While it's best foot first, . . .
At half-past five's Revelly, an' our tents they down must come,
Like a lot of button mushrooms when you pick 'em up at 'ome.
But it's over in a minute, an' at six the column starts,
While the women and the kiddies sit an' shiver in the carts.
An' it's best foot first, . . .
Oh, then it's open order, an' we lights our pipes an' sings,
An' we talks about our rations an' a lot of other things,
An' it's best foot first, . . .
It's none so bad o' Sunday, when you're lyin' at your ease,
To watch the kites a-wheelin' round them feather-'eaded trees,
Till it's best foot first, . . .
So 'ark an' 'eed, you rookies, which is always grumblin' sore,
There's worser things than marchin' from Umballa to Cawnpore;
An' if your 'eels are blistered an' they feels to 'urt like 'ell,
For it's best foot first, . . .
We're marchin' on relief over Injia's coral strand,
Eight 'undred fightin' Englishmen, the Colonel, and the Band;
Ho! get away you bullock-man, you've 'eard the bugle blowed,
There's a regiment a-comin' down the Grand Trunk Road;
With its best foot first
And the road a-sliding past,
An' every bloomin' campin'-ground exactly like the last;
While the Big Drum says,
The end
May no ill dreams disturb my rest,
Nor Powers of Darkness me molest.
The scene and its surroundings were photographed on my memory.
"What? Where?" she asked. "I can't see them anywhere."
In my room I sat down and tried calmly to reason out the matter.
"That!" said I, pointing to It.
"Has it gone, child ?" I gasped. Kitty only wept more bitterly.
"I'll stake my professional reputation"--he began.
"And Kitty?" I asked, dully.
I groaned and turned over to the other side.
I met Kitty on the homeward road--a shadow among shadows.
"There were no doolies," said the khansamah.
"Has this place always been a dak-bungalow?" I asked.
"A how much?"
"Do you remember anything about the Sahibs?"
Entered angrily the faithful partner of my sorrows, Kadir Baksh.
That was the bitterest thought of all!
Alive or dead-there is no other way.
I spun round quickly and faced the speaker.
"There is no way of getting out?"
"Now I will give you something to eat," said he.
"Well, and what then? Go on!"
"In how long? In how long?"
"Go inside, Gunga Dass," said I, "and fetch it out."
"Got what?  Return what?" asked.
"But if you knew all this why didn't you get out before?"
Brother to a Prince and fellow to a beggar if he be found worthy.
"Within ten," I said.
"But I'm going into the Indian Desert," I explained.
"Have you ever tried that trick?" I asked.
"Where have you come from?" said I.
"What did he do to his father's widow, then?"
It was a great and shining face.
"Tickets again?" said he.
The train had begun to move out. The red man rubbed his eyes.
Therefore we are going away to be Kings."
"Kings in our own right," muttered Dravot.
"Are you at all in earnest?" I said.
Signed by you and me this day.
I felt the butt of a Martini, and another and another.
"'God A'mighty!' says Dan, 'what is the meaning o' this?'
The momentary shift of my eyes had broken the clear current.
"The Son of Man goes forth to war,
A golden crown to gain;
His blood-red banner streams afar--
Who follows in His train?"
"Not to my knowledge," said the Superintendent.
And there the matter rests.
"O' ever the knightly years were gone
With the old world to the grave,
I was a king in Babylon
And you were a Christian slave."
"What's the trouble?" I said, knowing well what that trouble was.
"Yes I do--except when I look at this stuff. Ugh!"
"It needs compression," I suggested, cautiously.
"I want to do it at once. What do you think of it?"
Charlie became a bank-clerk at once.
"It came by itself." Charlie's eyes opened a little.
"What sort of ship?"
"How do you know that?"
"How is he chained?"
"I can, but I can't imagine your imagining it."
"Listen to this--
"'Wouldst thou,' so the helmsman answered,
'Know the secret of the sea?
Only those who brave its dangers
Comprehend its mystery.'
"'I remember the black wharves and the ships
And the sea-tides tossing free,
And the Spanish sailors with bearded lips,
And the beauty and mystery of the ships,
And the magic of the sea.'
"What sort of things?"
"Was the ship built so long ago as that?"
"Not in the least. Did you make up anything else?"
"Yes, but it's nonsense." Charlie flushed a little.
"Never mind; let's hear about it."
"Have you the paper on you?"
"I'll attend to those details. Show me what your men wrote."
"What is it supposed to mean in English?" I said.
"But all you've told me would make a long book."
"Make it then. You've only to sit down and write it out."
"Give me a little time. Have you any more notions?"
"But I want the details."
He talked of the galley--his own galley had he but known it--with
"Emar then, the arrow taking
From the loosened string,
Answered: 'That was Norway breaking
'Neath thy hand, O King.'"
He gasped with pure delight of sound.
"That's better than Byron, a little," I ventured.
"Better? Why it's true! How could he have known?"
I went back and repeated:
"'What was that?' said Olaf, standing
On the quarter-deck,
'Something heard I like the stranding
Of a shattered wreck.'"
"No, I'm tired. Let's talk. What happened the other night?"
"How was that managed?"
"And then?" I said, trying to put away the devil of envy.
"What a scoundrel!"
"That's curious. Our hero commanded the galley? Didn't he?"
"But you were all drowned together, Charlie, weren't you?"
"And what happened after that?"
Charlie did not raise his eyes.
"To Furdurstrandi?" I asked, tingling from head to foot.
"Do you know what you have said?" I shouted, incautiously.
"'But Othere, the old sea captain,
He neither paused nor stirred
Till the king listened, and then
Once more took up his pen
And wrote down every word.
In witness of the truth,
Raising his noble head,
He stretched his brown hand and said,
"Behold this walrus tooth."
"Charlie, what do you suppose are Skroelings?"
Then I walked round the situation.
"Not a ghost of a chance?"
"This seems to be an exception to the rule."
"Ah! I see. That story will never be written. You can try."
"I am going to."
"For your own credit and for the sake of money, of course?"
"How do you mean?"
"What I say. He has never, so far, thought about a woman."
"Hasn't he though!" I remembered some of Charlie's confidences.
I winced at the thought of my story being ruined by a housemaid.
And yet nothing was more probable.
Grish Chunder grinned.
"Or else what? Remember he does not know that he knows."
Grish Chunder looked at him keenly for a minute.
"I am going," said Grish Chunder.
He drew me into the lobby as he departed.
"Let me read it to myself."
"Read it aloud, then. You're like the rest of 'em."
Charlie was, in one way at least, very like one kind of poet.
Here is Charlie's "blank verse":
"Will you never let us go?
"Will you never let us go?
"Will you never let us go?"
"H'm. What's oar-thresh, Charlie?"
"But you said the other day that he was red-haired."
"No, an open ship--like a big boat."
This was maddening.
"There's an enormous amount in you."
"Something about the galley."
"I remember now. It's 25 per cent. of the profits, isn't it?"
"It's anything you like when I've done the tale."
"The day is most fair, the cheery wind
Halloos behind the hill,
Where bends the wood as seemeth good,
And the sapling to his will!
Riot O wind; there is that in my blood
That would not have thee still!
"She gave me herself, O Earth, O Sky:
Grey sea, she is mine alone--I
Let the sullen boulders hear my cry,
And rejoice tho' they be but stone!
'Mine! I have won her O good brown earth,
Make merry! 'Tis bard on Spring;
Make merry; my love is doubly worth
All worship your fields can bring!
Let the hind that tills you feel my mirth
At the early harrowing."
"Red cloud of the sunset, tell it abroad;
I am victor. Greet me O Sun,
Dominant master and absolute lord
Over the soul of one!"
"Well?" said Charlie, looking over my shoulder.
"Yes. It comes like a thunderclap. Are you very happy, Charlie?"
"What will your mother say?" I asked, cheerfully.
"I don't care a damn what she says."
In the pleasant orchard-closes
"God bless all our gains," say we;
But "May God bless all our losses,"
Better suits with our degree.
"Lucy, I don't believe you."
Mrs. Mallowe laughed long and merrily. "And what did you say?"
"No, thanks. Polly, I'm wearied of this life. It's hollow."
"Never mind how. I feel it. I want to be a Power before I die."
"Be a Power then. You've wits enough for anything--and beauty?"
"Will you talk sensibly?"
"I will, dear, for I see that you are going to make a mistake."
"Perhaps, but why? It seems so easy."
"Oh--er--hundreds," said Mrs. Hauksbee, vaguely.
"But there are scores--"
"And a military man?"
"There's a certain amount of wisdom in that view."
"Come into the veranda and look at the Mall!"
"Lucy, how can you be so absurd?"
"I've been through that too, dear," she said.
Mrs. Mallowe smiled in a superior and Sphinxlike fashion.
"I became an Influence," said she.
"No, I didn't Theosophilander. Jack says"--
"I made a lasting impression."
Mrs. Mallowe told.
"Absolutely, or I should never have taken it up."
"And his last promotion was due to you?"
Mrs. Mallowe nodded.
"And you warned him against the Topsham girl?"
Another nod.
"And told him of Sir Dugald Delane's private memo about him?"
A third nod.
"Polly, you are a most extraordinary woman."
"Can't you choose a prettier word?"
Dribble-dribble-trickle-trickle
What a lot of raw dust!
My dollie's had an accident
And out came all the sawdust!
"Who is it, mad woman? I'm sorry I ever spoke to you about it."
"So I see, but does it follow that he is your property?"
"In some cases."
"What's coming?" thought Mrs. Hauksbee.
"Proud of that," said Otis.
"Safe for the present," she said to herself.
Otis Yeere laughed bitterly.
"Because I must. How'm I to get out of it?"
"It is enough," answered Otis, very solemnly.
"Are you certain of that?" said Otis Yeere.
"Quite. We're writing about a house now.
'I will--at tonight's dance."
"Very few men understand your devotion thoroughly."
"He did that, did he?"
"Morals above reproach," purred Mrs. Mallowe.
"Was this before or after supper?"
"Oh! before--oceans before. Isn't it perfectly disgusting?"
"'Sweet thou has trod on a heart--
Pass! There's a world full of men
And women as fair as thou art,
Must do such things now and then.
"'Thou only hast stepped unaware--
Malice not one can impute;
And why should a heart have been there,
In the way of a fair woman's foot?'
'Polly, you take my sorrows in a most unfeeling way."
Men say it was a stolen tide--
The Lord that sent it he knows all,
But in mine ear will aye abide
The message that the bells let fall,
And awesome bells they were to me,
That in the dark rang, "Enderby."
Once upon a time there was a man and his Wife and a Tertium Quid.
"That's queer," said the Tertium Quid. "Where's my ulster?"
"What's queer?" said the Man's Wife.
"Little woman," said Boulte, quietly, "do you care for me?"
"Immensely," said she, with a laugh. "Can you ask it?"
"But I'm serious," said Boulte. "Do you care for me?"
"Ye-es, I've asked for it."
"What are you going to do?" said the woman, between her sobs.
"I haven't seen him," said Mrs. Boulte. "Good God! is that all?"
But Boulte was not listening, and her sentence ended in a gulp.
Boulte laughed grimly.
"Will you tell me what he said?" repeated Mrs. Boulte.
"You said he swore he had not cared for me. Was that true?"
"Yes," said Mrs. Vansuythen, very softly.
Boulte raised his head and said, slowly, "Oh, you liar!"
Kurrell's face changed. "What's that?" he asked, quickly.
"What do you mean?" he said.
Kurrell felt almost virtuous as he put the question.
"But it does! I tell you it does" began Kurrell, shamelessly.
"Well, what are you going to do?"
"Stop, please," said Mrs. Boulte "I want to speak to Ted."
"I've seen your husband, Mrs. Boulte.
What rendered vain their deep desire?
A God, a God their severance ruled,
And bade between their shores to be
The unplumbed, salt, estranging sea.
HE. As usual--to the world's end. No, Jakko.
SHE. Have your pony led after you, then. It's a long round.
HE. And for the last time, thank Heaven!
SHE. I! Oh! I don't know. I've had long enough to think, too.
HE. And you've changed your mind?
HE. Ours, Sweetheart, please.
Ha. That was wrong of you. You haven't been moping?
HE. Frankly, I do. Where was the difficulty?
HE. Nonsense. We shall be out of it.
SHE. You think so?
SHE. And the fun of the situation comes in--where, my Lancelot?
HE. Nowhere, Guinevere. I was only thinking of something.
HE.  Don't think of anything so ugly. We shall be beyond it.
HE. Love at least. Isn't that enough?
SHE. I have said so.
HE. And you think so still?
SHE. What do you think?
Ha. My Divinity--what else?
SHE. Nothing. Have you ever seen a man hanged?
SHE. What was it for?
HE. Murder, of course.
SHE. He gave it me, on Wednesday...our wedding-day, you know.
SHE. Don't you?
"Kind Sir, 0' your courtesy,
As you go by the town, Sir,
Pray you 0' your love for me,
Buy me a russet gown, Sir."
SHE. I wonder!
Ha. You think so? What is the mood now?
SHE. I can't tell. How cold it is! Let us get on quickly.
Ha. Goose! Between us, too! Damn Captain Congleton. There!
HE. And sit out with him, I suppose?
HE. What does he talk to you about?
SHE. What do men talk about when they sit out?
SHE. (after a pause). Do you know what you have said?
HE. 'Can't say that I do exactly. I'm not in the best of tempers.
HE. A good deal more than that.
HE. I never said a word.
Hp. How do you mean?
HE. In Heaven's name, why not?
SHE. Hush! The Other Place is quite enough. Ask yourself.
HE. I don't follow.
SHE. Tell me what you said to her.
HE. What does a man say to a girl? I've forgotten.
HE. Well, and then?
HE. Even bearable! It'll he Paradise.
SHE. "The holy state of matrimony!" Ha! ha! ha!
HE. Ssh! Don't laugh in that horrible way!
SHE. N-nothing. I'm better now.
SHE. Thank'oo. I'm 'fraid my hat's on one side, too.
SHE. Guy, what is my name?
HE. Eh! I don't follow.
SHE. Here's my cardcase. Can you read?
SHE. They'll be more scandalized before the end.
HE. Do-on't! I don't like you to talk in that way.
HE. Don't be affected.
SHE. I'm not. I'm Mrs. Buzgago. Listen!
Pendant une anne' toute entiere
Le regiment n'a pas r'paru.
On le r'porta comme perdu.
On se r'noncait a r'trouver sa trace,
Quand un matin subitement,
On le vit r'paraitre sur la place
L'Colonel toujours en avant.
That's the way she rolls her r's. Am I like her?
HE. No. We aren't children. Why can't you be rational?
HE. One or two. One can't make omelets without breaking eggs.
SHE (slowly). I don't see the necessity--
HE. Hah! What do you mean?
SHE. Shall I speak the truth?
HE. Under the circumstances, perhaps it would be as well.
SHE. Guy, I'm afraid.
HE. I thought we'd settled all that. What of?
SHE. Of you.
HE. Oh, damn it all! The old business! This is too had!
SHE. Of you.
HE. And what now?
SHE. What do you think of me?
HE. Beside the question altogether. What do you intend to do?
SHE. I daren't risk it. I'm afraid. If I could only cheat--
SHE. I never meant anything else.
SHE. It's not pretence, Guy. I am afraid.
HE. Please explain.
HE. I see that you are desperately unreasonable, little woman.
SHE. Please don't, dear. It hurts as much as if you hit me.
HE. It isn't exactly pleasant for me.
MRS. BUZGAGO (in the Old Library, con. molt. exp.).
See-saw! Margery Daw!
Sold her bed to lie upon straw.
To sell her bed and lie upon dirt?
SHE. Y~es. Good night, Guy. Don't be angry with me.
Est fuga, volvitur rota,
On we drift; where looms the dim port?
One Two Three Four Five contribute their quota:
Something is gained if one caught but the import,
"Hooks and eyes, surely," drawled Mrs. Mallowe.
"Perhaps they also expected"--
"Polly, don't be Rabelaisian!"
"Hah!" said Mrs. Hauksbee, shortly. "Indeed!"
"What is it?" said Mrs. Mallowe, sleepily.
"That dowd and The Dancing Master--to whom I object."
"0--oh! I think I've met that sort of man before. And isn't he?"
"What happened then?"
"And yet you encourage them?"
"Why couple me with the Hawley Boy? He is your property."
But Mrs. Mallowe had passed on.
"What is it?"
"Do you know anything about him?"
"No. I think Mrs. Delville may occupy his attention for a while."
"Do you suppose she knows that he is the head of a family?"
"I'm different. I've no sense of humor."
"Do you suppose that the Delville woman has humor?"
"Still with The Dancing Master, remember."
"She is twenty years younger than he."
"I wonder what those really are," said Mrs. Mallowe.
Mrs. Hauksbee studied herself in the glass.
"Just Heavens! When did she do that?"
"The Hawley Boy was riding with you. What did he think?"
"You are incorrigible, simply."
"You attach too much importance to The Dancing Master."
"Don't be uncharitable. Any sin but that I'll forgive."
"And what did that sweet youth do?"
"Tete-Fele'e," suggested Mrs. Mallowe.
complications."
"But what reason has she for being angry?"
Mrs. Mallowe sighed and made no answer.
"Oh, this is too bad!" said Mrs. Mallowe sulkily.
"Did he want much taking?"
"This is interesting. There! Now turn round. What happened?"
"I said he wouldn't."
"She does it for my sake," hinted the Virtuous Bent.
"A dangerous and designing woman," purred Mrs. Waddy.
Worst of all, every other hotel in Simla was full!
"Polly, are you afraid of diphtheria?"
"Where did you learn all this?"
"Well. What's on your mind?"
"I don't know," said Mrs. Hauksbee, simply.
Mrs. Delville turned her head.
Mrs. Hauksbee raised her head.
"Exactly," said the voice. "Ha-ow pahltry it all is!"
"What do you think?"
"Don't ask me. She was a woman. Go to sleep."
He patted Bobby on the shoulder and said: "Well done, my boy!"
"How do you know?" said Bobby, admiringly.
"What measures? 'Man can't run round coddling his men forever."
"Scales? What scales?"
Revere signed the last paper and the Sergeant retreated.
"No," said Bobby Wick. "Come and have some tiffin."
"As good a boy as I want," said Revere, the admiring skipper.
"What a nice boy!" said the matrons and the maids.
Leave the what at the what's-its-name,
Leave the flock without shelter,
Leave the corpse uninterred,
Leave the bride at the altar!
"But they were as fit as be-damned when I left them!" said Bobby.
"A little, sir," said Bobby.
"Well?" said Bobby, impatiently.
"Have you been here all night, you young ass?" said the Doctor.
Is there a single joy or pain,
That I should never kno-ow?
You do not love me, 'tis in vain,
Bid me goodbye and go!
The Surgeon-Major bent down--"What is it? Bobby?"--
Hurrah! hurrah! a soldier's life for me!
Shout, boys, shout! for it makes you jolly and free.
That is the prologue. This is the story:
"But this is childish and mediaeval nonsense!"
"Then it isn't accounts, Mr. Edwards," said Orde, cheerily.
"And they are full of the Congress, of course?"
"A native?" said Pagett.
"Why, certainly."
Orde looked at him with a dreary smile.
Again Pagett disregarded the closing sentence.
"Criminal tribes--er--I don't quite understand," said Pagett.
"But criminals, Orde!"
uncomfortable, though striving to assume a free and easy air.
"You learn English idioms at the Mission College, it seems."
"Your father is a good man, and I will do what I can for him."
Orde had scarcely retired with his telegram when Pagett began:
"These are some mere exceptions to the universal rule."
"Oh, sir, everything. England owes its greatness to Parliamentary
"What do you think of young India?" asked Orde.
"Curious, very curious--and callow."
"But he is a native and knows the facts."
"But does it succeed; do they make converts?"
"How do you mean?" asked Pagett.
"Which means?" queried Pagett.
"You find it a tiresome subject?"
"How do you mean?"
"They would act at least with intelligence and consideration."
"Er--I don't quite follow," said Pagett, uneasily.
"But do they marry so early?" said Pagett, vaguely.
"How d'you account for the general indifference, then?"
"That's seven hundred pounds," said Pagett, quickly.
"Is not this rather an ad hominem style of argument?"
"No, I don't quite admit it," said Pagett.
"You mean to say, then, it's not a spontaneous movement?"
Pagett laughed. "That's an epigrammatic way of putting it, Orde."
Look, you have cast out Love! What Gods are these
You bid me please?
It may be they shall give me greater ease
Than your cold Christ and tangled Trinities.
He was breathing queerly and was unconscious.
"How can what he and you said be untrue?" asked Lispeth.
"Then you have lied to me," said Lispeth, "you and he?"
There was a fair sprinkling of "H" on it besides "H" at supper.
Then we went in to supper.
"And some are sulky, while some will plunge
Some you must gentle, and some you must lunge.
Some--there are losses in every trade--
Will break their hearts ere bitted and made,
Will fight like fiends as the rope cuts hard,
Presently he came out and found me leaving cards on the Mess.
There was no one else in the ante-room.
He said: "The Boy has gone out shooting. DOES a man shoot
@tetur with a revolver and a writing-case?"
I said: "Nonsense, Major!" for I saw what was in his mind.
Then he thought for a minute, and said: "Can you lie?"
"You know best," I answered. "It's my profession."
Once I said: "What's the blazing hurry, Major?"
"Oh, he's out shooting," said I.
But there were reasons why we could not find a lock fit to send.
When Man and Woman are agreed, what can the Kazi do?
Sometimes more.
The Youghals went up to Simla in April.
"Dear old man,
About seven minutes later, there was a wild hurroosh at the Club.
The General, arrayed in purple and fine linen, was before him.
But he fills in his Departmental returns beautifully.
I am dying for you, and you are dying for another.
It was the last flicker before the light went out.
Which is manifestly unfair.
Tonight God knows what thing shall tide,
The Earth is racked and faint--
Expectant, sleepless, open-eyed;
And we, who from the Earth were made,
Thrill with our Mother's pain.
The social atmosphere was heavily charged and wanted clearing.
We met at the parade-ground at ten: the night was fearfully hot.
Thus, for a season, they fought it fair--
She and his cousin May--
Tactful, talented, debonnaire,
Decorous foes were they;
But never can battle of man compare
With merciless feminine fray.
She spent her life in proving that rule.
Mrs. Hauksbee wanted to keep him under her wing to the last.
Pit where the buffalo cooled his hide,
By the hot sun emptied, and blistered and dried;
Log in the reh-grass, hidden and alone;
Bund where the earth-rat's mounds are strown;
Cave in the bank where the sly stream steals;
Aloe that stabs at the belly and heels,
Jump if you dare on a steed untried--
Safer it is to go wide--go wide!
Hark, from in front where the best men ride:--
"Pull to the off, boys! Wide! Go wide!"
Mr. Beighton held his tongue. He was an easy-going man.
Then a pile of heads be laid--
Thirty thousand heaped on high--
All to please the Kafir maid,
Where the Oxus ripples by.
Grimly spake Atulla Khan:--
"Love hath made this thing a Man."
The two exceptions must have suffered from sunstroke.
What is in the Brahmin's books that is in the Brahmin's heart.
Neither you nor I knew there was so much evil in the world.
When the earth was sick and the skies were gray,
And the woods were rotted with rain,
The Dead Man rode through the autumn day
To visit his love again.
This showed itself later on.
He left her at Simla one August, and went down to his regiment.
Then she fell face down in the dirt as I came up.
Rosicrucian subtleties
In the Orient had rise;
Ye may find their teachers still
Under Jacatala's Hill.
Read what Flood the Seeker tells us
Of the Dominant that runs
Through the cycles of the Suns--
Read my story last and see
Luna at her apogee.
Which I believe was true, or nearly so.
Ride with an idle whip, ride with an unused heel.
But, once in a way, there will come a day
When the colt must be taught to feel
The lash that falls, and the curb that galls,
And the sting of the rowelled steel.
--Life's Handicap.
Then--with a scream:--
Don't blame me if he throws a glass at your head!
When great Jove nods;
But Little Tin Gods make their little mistakes
In missing the hour when great Jove wakes.
This tale is a justifiable exception.
There is a tide in the affairs of men,
Which, taken any way you please, is bad,
And strands them in forsaken guts and creeks
No decent soul would think of visiting.
You cannot stop the tide; but now and then,
You may arrest some rash adventurer
Who--h'm--will hardly thank you for your pains.
--Vibart's Moralities.
After that I don't know what happened. This much is certain.
"'I've forgotten the countersign,' sez 'e.
This is the Major's evidence in full:--
A stone's throw out on either hand
From that well-ordered road we tread,
And all the world is wild and strange;
Churel and ghoul and Djinn and sprite
Shall bear us company tonight,
For we have reached the Oldest Land
Wherein the Powers of Darkness range.
And here the story begins.
Cry "Murder!" in the market-place, and each
Will turn upon his neighbor anxious eyes
That ask:--"Art thou the man?"
We hunted Cain,
Some centuries ago, across the world,
That bred the fear our own misdeeds maintain
--Vibart's Moralities.
"Where's my husband?"
While the snaffle holds, or the "long-neck" stings,
While the big beam tilts, or the last bell rings,
While horses are horses to train and to race,
Then women and wine take a second place
While a short "ten-three"
Has a field to squander or fence to face!
Can a man stand upright in the face of the naked Sun;
If my feet fail me, O Heart of my Heart, am I to blame,
being blinded by the glimpse of your beauty?
Alas! alas! Can the Moon tell the Lotus of her love when the
Gate of Heaven is shut and the clouds gather for the rains?
They have taken my Beloved, and driven her with the pack-horses
There are iron chains on the feet that were set on my heart.
Call to the bowman to make ready--
Alone upon the housetops, to the North
I turn and watch the lightning in the sky,--
The glamour of thy footsteps in the North,
Come back to me, Beloved, or I die!
Below my feet the still bazar is laid
Far, far below the weary camels lie,--
The camels and the captives of thy raid,
Come back to me, Beloved, or I die!
My father's wife is old and harsh with years,
And drudge of all my father's house am I.--
My bread is sorrow and my drink is tears,
Come back to me, Beloved, or I die!
Bisesa was good to look upon.
A week, and then three weeks, passed without a sign from Bisesa.
They burnt a corpse upon the sand--
The light shone out afar;
It guided home the plunging boats
That beat from Zanzibar.
Spirit of Fire, where'er Thy altars rise.
Thou art Light of Guidance to our eyes!
This is a rule; so there must be an exception to prove it.
Moriarty's case was that exception.
He drank strong waters and his speech was coarse;
He purchased raiment and forebore to pay;
He struck a trusting junior with a horse,
And won Gymkhanas in a doubtful way.
Then, 'twixt a vice and folly, turned aside
To do good deeds and straight to cloak them, lied.
Here his voice died down, and Reggie stooped over him.
Then he turned his face to the wall and died.
The World hath set its heavy yoke
Upon the old white-bearded folk
Who strive to please the King.
God's mercy is upon the young,
God's wisdom in the baby tongue
That fears not anything.
"How much?" said the Legal Member.
The Legal Member left his place and moved up next to Tods.
"What do you know about Ryotwari, little man?" he said.
"Oh, they do--do they? What do they say, Tods?"
"You don't speak my talk, do you, Councillor Sahib?"
"No; I am sorry to say I do not," said the Legal' Member.
"Very well," said Tods. "I must fink in English."
"Tods! Go to bed," said his father.
Tods gathered up his dressing-gown tail and departed.
"Stopped in the straight when the race was his own!
Look at him cutting it--cur to the bone!"
"Ask ere the youngster be rated and chidden,
What did he carry and how was he ridden?
Maybe they used him too much at the start;
Maybe Fate's weight-cloths are breaking his heart."
--Life's Handicap.
"If a youth would be distinguished in his art, art, art,
He must keep the girls away from his heart, heart, heart."
"The boy's mad!" said the Head.
Go, stalk the red deer o'er the heather
Ride, follow the fox if you can!
But, for pleasure and profit together,
Allow me the hunting of Man,--
The chase of the Human, the search for the Soul
To its ruin,--the hunting of Man.
Nafferton went back to the second section of his fifth question.
There was a new man at the head of the Department of Castigation.
Nafferton was very sympathetic.
It was not in the open fight
We threw away the sword,
But in the lonely watching
In the darkness by the ford.
The waters lapped, the night-wind blew,
Full-armed the Fear was born and grew,
And we were flying ere we knew
From panic in the night.
The band stopped playing, and, for a moment, there was a hush.
"But I went back on my word," said the Colonel.
In the daytime, when she moved about me,
In the night, when she was sleeping at my side,--
I was wearied, I was wearied of her presence.
Day by day and night by night I grew to hate her--
Would to God that she or I had died!
And my conundrum is the most unanswerable of the three.
And the years went on as the years must do;
But our great Diana was always new--
Fresh, and blooming, and blonde, and fair,
With azure eyes and with aureate hair;
And all the folk, as they came or went,
Offered her praise to her heart's content.
Among the worshippers of the Venus Annodomini was young Gayerson.
"Your WHAT?" said he.
"Goodbye, Tom," whispered the Venus Annodomini.
Little Blind Fish, thou art marvellous wise,
Little Blind Fish, who put out thy eyes?
Open thine ears while I whisper my wish--
Bring me a lover, thou little Blind Fish.
A week later, Pack got his definite dismissal from Miss Hollis.
"If I can attain Heaven for a pice, why should you be envious?"
--Opium Smoker's Proverb.
But he wouldn't give us credit for a pipeful--not for anything.
--Munichandra, translated by Professor Peterson.
He got understanding a month later.
nd Mrs. Haggert understood.
I closed and drew for my love's sake,
That now is false to me,
And I slew the Riever of Tarrant Moss,
And set Dumeny free.
And ever they give me praise and gold,
And ever I moan my loss,
For I struck the blow for my false love's sake,
Then Simla laughed, for Wressley in love was slightly ridiculous.
Men often do their best work blind, for some one else's sake.
Not though you die tonight, O Sweet, and wail,
A spectre at my door,
Shall mortal Fear make Love immortal fail--
I shall but love you more,
Who from Death's house returning, give me still
One moment's comfort in my matchless ill.
"Where?" said Dumoise.
Dumoise threw the telegram across the table and said:--"Well?"
The other Doctor said nothing. It was all that he could say.
"Where is the Sahib going?" he asked.
"To Nuddea," said Dumoise, softly.
By the hoof of the Wild Goat up-tossed
From the Cliff where She lay in the Sun,
Fell the Stone To the Tarn where the daylight is lost;
So She fell from the light of the Sun,
And alone.
Now the fall was ordained from the first,
But the Stone Knows only Her life is accursed,
As She sinks in the depths of the Tarn,
And alone.
Oh, Thou who has builded the world,
Oh, Thou who hast lighted the Sun!
Oh, Thou who hast darkened the Tarn!
Judge Thou The Sin of the Stone that was hurled
By the Goat from the light of the Sun,
As She sinks in the mire of the Tarn,
Even now--even now--even now!
--From the Unpublished Papers of McIntosh Jellaludin.
"Say, is it dawn, is it dusk in thy Bower,
Thou whom I long for, who longest for me?
Oh be it night--be it--"
I was admitted to the McIntosh household--I and my good tobacco.
'I the Trinity illustrate,
Drinking watered orange-pulp--
In three sips the Aryan frustrate,
While he drains his at one gulp.--'
McIntosh Jellaludin apologized, saying:--
McIntosh never told me what position he had held before his fall.
"You were abominably drunk if that's what you mean," I said.
"Have you so many, then, McIntosh?"
He was very shaky and sick.
The papers were in a hopeless muddle.
I don't want the Giant's Robe to come true in my case.
So we settled it all when the storm was done
As comf'y as comf'y could be;
Because he was five and a man;
And that's how it all began, my dears,
And that's how it all began.
"Yes, he's eaten two."
"Let me try," said Maisie, imperiously. "I'm all right now."
"Why? Because you're going away from Mrs. Jennett?"
"I don't know," she said. "I suppose it is."
"Maisie, you must know. I'm not supposing."
"Let's go home," said Maisie, weakly.
"I don't believe you ever did care."
"I do, indeed I do; but it won't be any use."
"Because I am going away."
"We shall be awfully late for tea," said Maisie. "Let's go home."
"It's very pretty," he said.
"Artists always want money, don'tthey?"
Then we brought the lances down, then the bugles blew,
When we went to Kandahar, ridin' two an" two,
Ridin', ridin', ridin', two an" two,
All the way to Kandahar, ridin' two an" two.
"No. I'm amusing myself here."
"Heldar. Do they give me a free hand?"
So he thinks he shall take to the sea again
For one more cruise with his buccaneers,
"But you're looking tucked up," he concluded.
"Now, what lunacy has been your latest?"
"Ouf!" said he. "That's heavenly! Well?"
"Why in the world didn't  you come to me?"
"They're a remarkably sensible people."
"You're a great deal too kind, old man."
"Do you mean to say that you are going to keep them?"
"You will in a minute. Be good enough to give back my sketches."
The wolf-cub at even lay hid in the corn,
When the smoke of the cooking hung gray:
He knew where the doe made a couch for her fawn,
And he looked to his strength for his prey.
But the moon swept the smoke-wreaths away.
And he turned from his meal in the villager"s close,
And he bayed to the moon as she rose.
"Be careful, old man. That way lies bad work."
"When were you under Kami, man of extraordinary beginnings?"
"Modest man! Go on."
"A man might have gone to a pub, and got decently drunk."
"It won't. It has taught me what Art--holy sacred Art--means."
"You've learnt something while I've been away. What is Art?"
"Once more, modest child!"
"So I told him. I don't  think he believes it."
"How should he know? He thinks he is his own master."
"Did he cut you out?"
"Yes. No. Do you mean Amomma?"
"Ye--es. No. This. Where have you come from?"
"Over there," He pointed eastward through the fog. "And you?"
"What do you do?"
"I paint a great deal. That's all I have to do."
"Why, what's happened? You had three hundred a year."
"I have that still. I am painting; that's all."
"Are you alone, then?"
"Then you noticed it too?"
"Of course I did. You're always out of step."
"So I am. I'm sorry. You went on with the painting?"
"But Kami is in Paris surely?"
"Do you sell much?"
"That's "His Last Shot," second edition. Go on."
The Nilghai winced. He had not thought of this.
"Why, it isn't  seven yet!" said Torpenhow, with amazement.
The door shut and was locked.
"What can you do with a man like that?" said the Nilghai.
"Leave him alone. He's as mad as a hatter."
There was no answer.
"I have a thousand men," said he,
"To wait upon my will,
And towers nine upon the Tyne,
And three upon the Till."
"And what care I for you men," said she,
"Or towers from Tyne to Till,
"Sith you must go with me," she said,
"To wait upon my will?"
"Well, madman, how d'you feel?"
"I don't know. I'm trying to find out."
"You had much better do some work."
"Beeton, did Mr. Heldar dine out at all while I was out of town?"
"I know what palette-knifing means. What was the piccy?"
"A fancy head that wouldn't come right,--horrid thing!"
"You're as untidy as ever."
"That comes well from you. Look at your own cuff."
"Not in this place, surely?"
"Of course not. The Salon."
"You fly high."
"I don't exhibit. I sell."
"What is your line, then?"
"Number Three'll be off the limber, next jolt," was the answer.
That was something that she could understand.
"Yes. I see. Oh, what a thing to have come to one!"
"I call it success. Tell me how you got it."
"Do it with me, then, dear. I won't interrupt."
"Naturally. We belong."
Maisie looked up for a moment and dropped her eyes.
"You! No. How could you?"
"Liver out of order?"
"And you may lead a thousand men,
Nor ever draw the rein,
But ere ye lead the Faery Queen
'Twill burst your heart in twain."
He has slipped his foot from the stirrup-bar,
The bridle from his hand,
And he is bound by hand and foot
To the Queen 'o Faery-land.
Maisie protested; she did not care for the pure line.
"But other people----" began Maisie.
"Isn't that bad enough?"
You're fond of him?"
"Not good enough," he said shortly. "I'm too comf'y where I am."
"Be hanged if I do!"
"That's a bad sign," said the Nilghai, in an undertone.
"Shouldn't wonder if that has made him a trifle mad."
"I should. He's a most businesslike madman."
call for you tomorrow after breakfast early."
"But surely you are going to ask----"
"But where are we going?"
"Wait and see."
"Yes. How she beat you for it! I never told it was you."
"I should make a face."
"No, of course you never did. Good heavens! look at the sea."
"Why, it's the same as ever!" said Maisie.
"It's worse than anything I imagined," said Torpenhow.
"It isn't a woman. It's one woman; and it's a girl."
"Where's your proof?"
"Don't be certain. Perhaps it's only a married woman."
Roses red and roses white
Plucked I for my love's delight.
She would none of all my posies,--
Bade me gather her blue roses.
Half the world I wandered through,
Seeking where such flowers grew;
Half the world unto my quest
Answered but with laugh and jest.
It may be beyond the grave
She shall find what she would have.
Mine was but an idle quest,--
Roses white and red are best!
"I don't see the old breakwater," said Maisie, under her breath.
"Now, if Ammoma were only here!" said Maisie.
She shook her head and looked out to sea.
"Maisie, darling, doesn't it make any difference?"
"Don't you think that it ever will?"
"Is that true, dear?"
"What in the world for?"
"Yes, I have, and talking only makes it worse."
"Then don't talk about it."
"No. It does not."
"You"d tell me if it did?"
"I should let you know, I think."
"Did you listen?"
"You don't like being laughed at, Maisie, do you?"
Maisie hesitated. "He--he says that there is feeling in them."
"It isn't a fib."
"And now you say the same thing. It's so disheartening."
"I didn't say that, and I don't think it."
"It's amateurish, then."
"You don't laugh at me behind my back?"
"Well? Why am I wrong in trying to get a little success?"
"But how does that affect----"
"I understand that."
"But surely one can do that sometimes?"
"Who is afraid?--you, or the sun?"
"Can one work there?"
"I don't quite like that place. It sounds lazy. Tell me another."
"Is that all true?"
"Why?" said Maisie.
"Is it a wreck?" said Maisie, to whom these words were as Greek.
"What does that mean?"
"Not as a brother, though. You said you didn't--in the Park."
"Do you honestly believe that?"
"Ye--es. I feel so wicked about it."
"Wickeder than usual?"
"You don't know all I think. It's almost too awful to tell."
"Never mind. You promised to tell me the truth--at least."
"You aren't angry? Remember, I do despise myself."
"How can you believe all that?"
"Isn't it nice to get credit even for bad work?"
"How ghastly!"
"I'm glad you allow that much."
"And when he doesn't say pretty things?"
"I don't like the view."
"I suppose I must."
"A great deal--if you had it too."
"This doesn't seem to bear on the argument--but in what way?"
"Darling, I think I can."
"It's some time since I tried. What was the trouble? Overwork?"
"How do you know?"
"Never mind. Is your three hundred a year safe?"
"It's in Consols."
"Don't scold me so! I'm not likely to be foolish."
Maisie watched the face working in the moonlight.
"You've plenty of pennies now," she said soothingly.
"Why threepence?"
"You're much more interested in that than you are in me."
"I don't know, I don't think I am."
"You're making fun of me!"
"Your success too?"
"That's absurd," said she. "It wouldn't be proper."
And these two, as I have told you,
Were the friends of Hiawatha,
Chibiabos, the musician,
And the very strong man, Kwasind.
'Young lambs to sell, young lambs to sell,
If I'd as much money as I could tell,
I never would cry, Young lambs to sell!'"
"Back at last?" said Torpenhow.
"More or less. What have you been doing?"
"Where did you go?"
"Did you see anything you knew?"
"Did She make you feel restless?" asked the Nilghai, keenly.
Here the Nilghai began to laugh, and Torpenhow joined him.
"Yes, of course."
"By Jove, did I? I thought it was in one of my colour-boxes."
"What did you do with it?"
"Took the Nilghai to a theatre and fed him."
"I withdraw the motion."
"Binkie-dog, he's a lazy hog, isn't he?" said the Nilghai.
"I wonder . . . Where do you think he has been today?"
"Yes; but did he go alone?"
"It might be his salvation," Torpenhow said.
"Hasn't got any."
"It's a scandalous waste of time," said Torpenhow.
"Give him some clothes this time."
"Anything you've sold?" said the Nilghai.
"Were you a steward or a stoker in those days?"
"But what has this to do with the picture?"
"The passengers must have thought you mad."
"What was she like?" said Torpenhow.
"I see. That must have been cheerful."
"What was the notion?"
"Two lines in Poe--
"Did the woman inspire you much?" said Torpenhow.
"What happened after all?"
"And the woman?"
"You won't find them here," said the Nilghai.
"How do they call moose in Canada, Nilghai?"
"What shall I sing?" said he, turning in the chair.
""Moll Roe in the Morning,"" said Torpenhow, at a venture.
Then came the chorus--
"The first land we made it was called the Deadman,"
and they sang to the end very vigourously.
"Oh, Vanity! Begin." And the Nilghai began--
"It depends on the man," said Torpenhow.
"The man who has been down to look at the sea," said the Nilghai.
"I didn't know she was going to upset me in this fashion."
"The sea isn't sending you five notes a day," said the Nilghai.
"Let's give him a little of both. Get the bellows, Torp."
I don't think it," said the Nilghai.
"Hear, hear," from the Nilghai.
"He must go alone. He speaks truth, Torp."
He went out of the room.
"If I have taken the common clay
And wrought it cunningly
In the shape of a god that was digged a clod,
The greater honour to me."
"If thou hast taken the common clay,
And thy hands be not free
From the taint of the soil,  thou hast made thy spoil
The greater shame to thee."
"What's the good of suggesting anything?" he said pointedly.
"I suppose not. But you won't have time for the Salon."
Maisie hesitated a little. She even felt uncomfortable.
"I took it from a book."
"The description of the Melancolia--
'Her folded wings as of a mighty eagle,
But all too impotent to lift the regal
Robustness of her earth-born strength and pride.
And here again. (Maisie, get the tea, dear.)
'The forehead charged with baleful thoughts and dreams,
The household bunch of keys, the housewife's gown,
Voluminous indented, and yet rigid
As though a shell of burnished metal frigid,
Her feet thick-shod to tread all weakness down."
'Three centuries and threescore years ago,
With phantasies of his peculiar thought.'
"You don't understand," said Maisie. "I think I can do it."
Again the voice of the girl behind him--
I fancy Maisie means to embody herself in the picture."
The red-haired girl rose up and left the room, laughing.
"I must, if I want to get the picture done."
"And that's all you want?"
"I must do my work."
"No, love. I want you unbroken--all to myself."
"Feeling better?" said Torpenhow.
"And how do you like being your own mistress?"
"Do I look as if I liked it?"
"You're a man," said Torpenhow.
"Perhaps she won't come back."
"But surely you're not taking her out of charity?--to please me?"
"Never heard a word about the lady before."
"They're as proud as a turkey when they hold the ready cash,
You ought to 'ear the way they laugh an' joke;
"That depends on how you behave."
"Come here a minute, old man. I'm in trouble"--
"What the devil right have you to interfere?" he said, at last.
"I don't. I wish I did."
"I believe you're right. Where shall I go?"
What's you that follows at my side?--
The foe that ye must fight, my lord.--
That hirples swift as I can ride?--
The shadow of the night, my lord.--
Then wheel my horse against the foe!--
He's down and overpast, my lord.
Ye war against the sunset glow;
The darkness gathers fast, my lord.
----The Fight of Heriot's Ford
The next good joy that Mary had,
It was the joy of three,
To see her good Son Jesus Christ
Making the blind to see;
Making the blind to see, good Lord,
And happy we may be.
To all eternity!
Again the whirl of words, but this time they conveyed a meaning.
"Can you give me anything to drink?"
"Perhaps one year."
"My God! And if I don't take care of myself?"
'Understand the speech and feel a stir
Of fellowship in all disastrous fight.'
Binkie swung head downward for a moment without speaking.
"You're pleased today," said Bessie.
"Mean! You'll see when Mr. Torpenhow comes back."
"Is this you?" said Torpenhow.
The lark will make her hymn to God,
The partridge call her brood,
While I forget the heath I trod,
The fields wherein I stood.
'Tis dule to know not night from morn,
But deeper dule to know
I can but hear the hunter's horn
That once I used to blow.
"Yes, if he has been as good a man as you."
"How the Arab who cut his head open would grin if he knew!"
"Amen! She is a beauty. I can feel it."
"I reform tomorrow. Good night."
"Torp! Torp! where are you? For pity's sake, come to me!"
"What's the matter?"
"Lie down. It's all over now."
"Now we mustn't listen. Here's an island shouting across seas of
"Not if I'm with you. Proceed gingerly."
"Let's get nearer. They're in column, aren't they?"
"Yes. How did you know?"
"They'll move off in a minute. Don't jump when the band begins."
"Sticks crossed above his head," whispered Torpenhow.
"I know. I know! Who should know if I don't? H'sh!"
"He must be a man of decent height,
He must be a man of weight,
He must come home on a Saturday night
In a thoroughly sober state;
He must know how to love me,
And he must know how to kiss;
And if he's enough to keep us both
I can't refuse him bliss."
There were three friends that buried the fourth,
The mould in his mouth and the dust in his eyes
And they went south and east, and north,--
The strong man fights, but the sick man dies.
There were three friends that spoke of the dead,--
The strong man fights, but the sick man dies.--
"And would he were with us now," they said,
"The sun in our face and the wind in our eyes."
"I know they aren't. But what can I do?"
"But I picked it up when he was off his head."
said the Keneu. "Is it possible?"
"Speak to him," said the Nilghai.
"No! Leave me alone. How often must I remind you that I'm blind?"
"Nothing I could go for to fetch for to carry for to bring?"
"No. Take those infernal creaking boots of yours away."
A voice on the staircase began to sing joyfully--
"When we go--go--go away from here,
Our creditors will weep and they will wail,
"It's in the Soudan, as usual."
A roar of laughter interrupted him.
"Will there be any force at Suakin?" said a voice.
"He said he was going to stay at home," said the Keneu.
"But I forgot. I wish I were going with you."
"Oh, yes. You'll see him," said the Nilghai.
The sun went down an hour ago,
I wonder if I face towards home;
If I lost my way in the light of day
How shall I find it now night is come?
"Maisie, come to bed."
"It's so hot I can't sleep. Don't worry."
"Faugh!" said Maisie, stepping back.
"Only a conscript kissing the cook," said Maisie.
"Maisie, wake up. You'll catch a chill."
"I am Maisie," was the answer from the depths of a great sun-hat.
"Blind!" said Maisie, stupidly. "He can't be blind."
"He has been stone-blind for nearly two months."
"Would you care to see for yourself?" said Torpenhow.
"Did Mr. Heldar send you to me?"
"What?" The girl was on the sofa no longer.
"Are you going to him?"
"I must think."
"I am coming," said she, her eyes on the ground.
"But what will you do," she said to her companion.
"I came--I came--to see you, please."
"I know. I know. Why didn't you tell me?"
"I couldn't write."
"You might have told Mr. Torpenhow."
"What has he to do with my affairs?"
He groped back to his chair, his chest labouring as he sat down.
"I wanted to come. I did indeed," she protested.
"Are you better now?" he said.
"Yes, but--don't you hate me?"
"I hate you? My God! I?"
And that is the end of Maisie.
"Don't ask me too much. I'm only a man."
"You've tried to be an angel very successfully."
Somebody hammered at the studio door.
"I should like to, but I can't. I'm not feeling frolicsome."
"Then, I'll tell the boys and they'll drag you like a badger."
"No, thanks, I've a headache already."
"Go to the devil--oh, send Binkie in here."
"When do you start?"
"The day after tomorrow--for Brindisi."
"That's a slender amount for housekeeping, isn't it?"
"Oh, it's only for--marriage expenses."
"I wish I were going."
Yet at the last, ere our spearmen had found him,
Yet at the last, ere a sword-thrust could save,
Yet at the last, with his masters around him,
He of the Faith spoke as master to slave;
Yet at the last, tho' the Kafirs had maimed him,
Broken by bondage and wrecked by the reiver,--
Yet at the last, tho' the darkness had claimed him,
He called upon Allah and died a believer.--Kizzilbashi.
"I'll pay my rent and messing. Isn't that enough?"
"'E said "e couldn't stand it no more," he explained.
"He never said you read badly, Alf?" Mrs. Beeton spoke.
"Lend it to me for a minute and I'll tell you."
"What was in the letter?" asked Mrs. Beeton, when Alf returned.
"No. 'Orspital blind. He can't see. That's him over there."
"I was going for a walk," said Bessie.
"I've only seen it work. Mr. Beeton."
"And where's--where's Mr. Torpenhow?" she inquired at last.
"He has gone away to the desert."
"No, only weeks, Bess. You can't expect them to care."
"I don't use it much now."
"As you are."
"What are you trying to do?"
"How could I help it? Dust away."
"I had no intention of doing such, I do assure you."
"A few, but I don't care to have them looking at me."
"Very angry, you did."
"I have heaps somewhere," he said helplessly.
"Do I look like a sweep, then?"
"You'd better come and housekeep for me then, Bessie."
"It was generally under the tobacco-jar. Ah!"
"Oh yes," she said uneasily.
She laughed nervously, and slipped out of his reach.
"Then I--but aren't you sure Mr. Torpenhow didn't tell you?"
"What? Say that again." The man's hand had closed on her wrist.
"Isn't there anything left of the thing?"
"Hit you! No! Let's think."
"Because I was that angry. I'm not angry now--I'm awful sorry."
"What mistake?"
"Let me go," said Bess, her face darkening. "Let me go."
"All in good time. Did you ever attend Sunday school?"
"Never. Let me go, I tell you; you're making fun of me."
"I'm sorry; I'm awful sorry about the picture."
"About getting away--and money. Me and you going away."
"Of course. We will get away--that is to say, I will."
"You shall have fifty whole pounds for spoiling a picture."
"You said you couldn't do anything without me."
"Beeton will, and you'll lose fifty pounds. That's all. Get it."
"The Colgong," said the clerk.
"Galleons. Twelve-forty, Thursday."
"What are you going to do?"
"Going away, of course. What should I stay for?"
"But you can't look after yourself?"
"Shall I sure?"
The housekeeper came.
"I'm insured for two hundred and seventy."
"Insurance policies is no criterion, though I don't say----"
"Fifty," said Mr. Beeton, without a moment's hesitation.
"Double it; or I'll break up half my sticks and burn the rest."
"That's sinful, sir," said the housekeeper, alarmed.
"It's my own. One hundred or----"
"But the quarter's notice?"
"I'll pay forfeit. Look after the packing and leave me alone."
"We'll never come back any more, boys,
We'll never come back no more;
We'll go to the deuce on any excuse,
And never come back no more!
Oh say we're afloat or ashore, boys,
Oh say we're afloat or ashore;
But we'll never come back any more, boys,
We'll never come back no more!"
"Mr. Beeton! Mr. Beeton! Where the deuce is my pistol?"
"Not a thing, and the stove's nigh red-hot."
With a heart of furious fancies,
Whereof I am commander;
With a burning spear and a horse of air,
To the wilderness I wander.
With a knight of ghosts and shadows
I summoned am to tourney--
Ten leagues beyond the wide world's end,
Methinks it is no journey.
--Tom o' Bedlam's Song
"Give Mr. Torpenhow my love if you see him, won't you?"
"Who'll look after you on this ship?"
"Not they. Take me there, and I can look after myself."
"I was over there in England and I went blind."
"I am not poor--I shall pay you well."
"My friend is there.
"Thy friend! Chtt! Thy friend is death, then."
"As soon as may be." She was talking as though he were a child.
"For this reason even the mules go up in the iron-train."
"It is all covered with iron, because it is still being shot at."
"An armoured train. Better and better! Go on, faithful George."
"So I find it. When does this armoured train go?"
"At six o"clock. It takes an hour to cover the seven miles."
"Are the Fuzzies on the rampage--eh?"
"Big camp at Tanai, I suppose?"
"Pretty big. It has to feed our desert-column somehow."
"Is that far off?"
"Between thirty and forty miles--in an infernal thirsty country."
"Is the country quiet between Tanai and our men?"
"They always did."
"Have you been here before, then?"
"I was through most of the trouble when it first broke out."
"I am a public school man."
There is a fore-truck, isn't there?"
"Yes. How d'you know?"
George's hand on his arm pulled him back to the situation.
"And what now?" said George.
He must go up alone, and go immediately.
"Not for money?"
"H'm! Ah! English money?"
Another depressing interval of silence.
"But where, in God's name, are the troops?"
"What's the row now?" he cried.
"A good camel," he said at last.
When Israel of the Lord believed
Out of the land of bondage came.
"Is there a moon?" he asked drowsily.
"She is near her setting."
"Go on. The night is very cold."
"I smell the dawn," he whispered.
"It is here, and yonder are the troops. Have I done well?"
"Go on. We must get there swiftly. Go on."
"Am I in better case? Go forward."
Two or three shots were fired.
There was no time to ask any questions.
"Get down, man! Get down behind the camel!"
Duke of Derry's (Pink) Hussars.
Yours always,
The wild hawk to the wind-swept sky,
The deer to the wholesome wold,
And the heart of a man to the heart of a maid,
As it was in the days of old.
Miss T. As high up on the shoulder as possible.
BEARER. (Rapping at door.) Captain Sahib aya.
Miss T. Oh, bother! (Aloud.) Very well, Mamma.
Miss D. You look pink. What has happened?
Miss D. Who is this Captain Gadsby? I don't think I've met him.
Miss D. (Abstractedly.) Does he wax that moustache?
Miss T. (Busy with Powder-puff.) Yes, I think so. Why?
Miss T. (Sternly.) Only what? Out with it, Emma.
Miss T. Yes, I promise. What did she say?
Miss T. 'Sure I don't care. I'm not afraid of Captain Gadsby.
Capt. G. No sugar, tha-anks, and very little milk. Ha-Hmmm.
Miss T. (Aside.) Oh, this is agonizing. I must say something.
Capt. G. I beg your pardon. You were going to say--
Miss T. No, I made these myself. What are they like?
Capt. G. These! De-licious. (Aside.) And that's a fact.
Capt. G. He's so awf'ly stupid.
Miss T Then you should explain the dinner, dish by dish.
Capt. G. But I can't speak the vernacular.
Capt. G. I have, but I don't seem to be any the wiser. Are you?
Capt. G. (Admiringly.) How do you know?
Miss T. I have tried both ways.
Capt. G. Do you ride much, then? I've never seen you on the Mall.
Capt. G. Good gracious! What's that?
Miss T. (Wickedly.) Why? Won't Mamma dance with you any more?
Capt. G. She says that no exercise tires her.
Miss T. Very likely. Why not change Eleven for a square?
Captain Gadsby watches the interlude with undisguised admiration.
They ride out of the garden. The Captain falls back.
Capt. G. (Aside.) How that habit catches her under the arms! Ugh!
Et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.
Miss D. (Level intonation.) Well?
Miss T. (Ascending intonation.) Well?
Miss T. (Demurely.) He--he--he only spoke yesterday afternoon.
Miss D. (With intense interest.) Yes, dear?
Miss T. (Piano.) It's quite true--about-the-egg.
Miss D. What egg?
Certain people of importance.
DOONE. Who's dead now?
Blayne. No one that I know of; but Gadsby's hooked at last!
Blayne. She's a girl--daughter of a Colonel Somebody.
Doone. Simla's stiff with Colonels' daughters. Be more explicit.
Blayne. Wait a shake. What was her name? Thresomething. Three--
Curtiss. Stars, perhaps. Caddy knows that brand.
Mackesy. Threegan Isn't she a little bit of a girl with red hair?
Blayne. 'Bout that--from what from what Markyn said.
Mackesy. The Threegan girl's engaged, so Blayne says.
Blayne. Caddy has money--lucky devil. Place at Home, too.
Blayne. (Stiffly.) Not much, thaanks.
Curtiss. And of the eternal mutton--chop in the morning.
Doone. It's a dead goat as a rule, but go on, Mackesy.
Doone. Luxurious dogs, wallowing in--
OMNES. (Drinking.) A damned brave woman
Curtiss. Gadsby never had dealings with a shroff in his life.
Curtiss. Ask Cockley--with his wife dying by inches!
Blayne. Can't you take leave?
@chi-chi anent
to bring home for the holidays.
Enter ANTHONY, Indian Medical Staff, very white and tired.
Curtiss. How's Mingle?
Blayne. He's a nervous little chap. What has he got, this time?
GENERAL CHORUS. Poor little devil! Why doesn't he get away?
Mackesy. All the Station knows it.
Anthony. What do you say?
Curtiss. I say fifty.
Mackesy. I go twenty better.
Jervoise. Eh? What's that? What's that?
Jervoise. What man? Any one dead?
Anthony. No. Divorce Court at last?
Blayne. Worse. He's engaged!
Anthony. How much? He can't be!
Curtiss. 'Regiment cut up rough, think you?
Anthony. 'Don't know anything about the Regiment.
Mackesy. It is bigamy, then?
Curtiss. She may be now. Two months of Naini Tal works wonders.
Doone. What makes you take her character away so confidently?
Only why should it be with pain at all?
Why must I 'twixt the leaves of coronal
Put any kiss of pardon on thy brow?
Why should the other women know so much,
And talk together--Such the look and such
The smile he used to love with, then as now.
Capt. G. I didn't know--
Mrs. H. It really was.
Capt. G. Anything about it, I mean.
Capt. G. Have you?
Capt. G. I haven't given the Vaynor man a thought.
Mrs. H. But how d'you know that I haven't?
Mrs. H. Well! Haven't you the grace to apologize, bad man?
Capt. G. (Desperately.) By all means dictate.
Capt. G. "Sincere repentance."
Mrs. H. "For having behaved"--
Mrs. H. Really, Pip, you're getting more absurd every day.
Mrs. H. I want to know what you meant by what you said just now.
Capt. G. Exactly what I said. No less.
Mrs. H. But what have I done to deserve it? What have I done?
Capt. G. (Fingering menu-card.) Well, it has. That's all.
Capt. G. It's all right. (Aside.) Here comes the storm!
Capt. G. I'm sure I don't know. (To Khitmatgar.) Ohe! Simpkin do.
Capt. G. I'm sure I don't know. Don't speak so loud!
Capt. G. I've spoken the truth.
Capt. G. Since you insist upon my repeating it--Yes.
Capt. G. Yes. (Aside.) I think I deserve this.
Capt. G. No--not that!
Capt. G. Spare him. (Aside.) I wonder what his version is.
Capt. G. "But what imports the nomination of this gentleman?"
Capt. G. (Aside.) What a clever little woman it is!
Mrs. H. Well, what have you to say?
Capt. G. I feel better.
Capt. G. It doesn't alter the situation.
Mrs. H. He! I hate him. He introduced you to me.
Mrs. H. In common politeness I--We have got beyond that!
Mrs. H. Your what? Ha, ha!
Capt. G. Dishonor, then. She's not what you imagine. I meant to--
Capt. G. It doesn't hurt so much after your little lecture--with
demonstrations.
Capt. G. (Under his eyebrows.) Are you certain of that?
Capt. G. (Feebly.) Oh, come! I'm not so low as you think.
And are not afraid with any amazement.
Capt. M. Wake up, my sleeping beauty! (Roars.)
"Uprouse ye, then, my merry merry men!
It is our opening day!
It is our opening da-ay!"
Capt. G. (Emerging from dressing-room.) What time is it?
Capt. M. Nearly eleven.
Capt. G. Five hours more. O Lord!
Capt. G. I can't eat anything. I don't want any breakfast.
Leads G. downstairs and stands over him while he eats two chops.
Capt. M. Time to come for a walk. Light up.
Capt. G. Any chance of seeing Her?
Capt. G. (Halting in the middle of the road.) I say, Jack.
The two tramp at five miles an hour for fifteen minutes.
Capt. M. Invariably. The Padre leads off with his boots.
Capt. M. (With a face like a wall.) Ya-as. Whose for choice?
An' since 'twas very clear we drank only ginger-beer,
Faith, there must ha' been some stingo in the ginger."
Capt. G. What on earth do I want to lie down for?
Capt. M. Give me a light from your cheroot and see.
Capt. M. You are. I'll get you a peg and you'll go to sleep.
They return and M. compounds a four-finger peg.
Capt. G. O bus! bus! It'll make me as drunk as an owl.
Capt. G. It's absurd. I sha'n't sleep, I know I sha'n't!
Capt. M. Up with you! Get into your kit.
Capt. C. What's the hurry?
Capt. M. You've got to be there first.
Capt. C. To be stared at?
Capt. G. dresses. M. follows suit.
Capt. M. Let's make bally asses of ourselves!
"Good-peo-ple-all To prayers-we call."
"We honor the King
And Brides joy do bring--
Good tidings we tell,
And ring the Dead's knell."
"The Voice that breathed o'er Eden,
That earliest marriage day,
The primal marriage-blessing,
It hath not passed away."
Capt. G. How long does this hymn go on for?
Capt. M. My Sainted Mother! The last stage of collapse!
Capt. M. (In a whisper.) Form the halt--inward wheel.
Capt. G. obeys mechanically and the ceremony proceeds.
PADRE. . . . only unto her as ye both shall live?
Capt. G. (His throat useless.) Ha-hmmm!
Capt. M. Say you will or you won't. There's no second deal here.
PADRE. . . . joined together let no man put asunder.
Capt. G. paralyzed with fear jibs after Blessing.
Capt. M. Dismiss! Break off! Left wheel!
All troop to vestry. They sign.
Capt. G. (Rubbing the ink into his glove.) Eh! Wha-at?
Capt. M. (Taking one pace to Bride.) If you don't, I shall.
Capt. G. (Interposing an arm.) Not this journey!
General kissing, in which Capt. G. is pursued by unknown female.
Capt. G. (Faintly to M.) This is Hades! Can I wipe my face now?
Capt. M. My responsibility has ended. Better ask Misses GADSBY.
Capt. M. (At table.) Up with you, Gaddy. They expect a speech.
AYAH. Missie Captain Sahib done gone band karo all the jutis.
Horse comes round on his hind legs; refuses to let G. handle him.
"You may carve it on his tombstone, you may cut it on his card,
That a young man married is a young man marred!"
THE GARDEN OF EDEN And ye shall be as--Gods!
Mrs. G. My husband!
Capt. G. Did you give her my love?
Mrs. G. I guessed, Phil.
Capt. G. (Rapturously.) Lit-tle Featherweight!
Mrs. G. I won" t be called those sporting pet names, bad boy.
Mrs. G. It has. I haven't ceased wondering at it yet.
Capt. G. How could I help it? You were you, you know.
Mrs. G. Did you ever want to help it? Speak the truth!
Mrs. G. Thank you, sir! And when was I ever?
Mrs. C. Yes, you are. But I--what have I ever done?
Capt. G. Given me a wee bit of your heart, haven't you, my Queen!
Mrs. G. Humble! I don't believe it's in your character.
Capt. G. What do you know of my character, Impertinence?
Capt. G. Little witch! I believe you know me thoroughly already.
Mrs. G. I think I can guess. You're selfish?
Mrs. G. And a dear?
Capt. G. That is as my lady pleases.
Mrs. G. And we're talking nonsense.
Mrs. G. Ye-es. Only to you.
Capt. G. I love you.
Mrs. G. Re-ally! For how long?
Capt. G. Forever and ever.
Mrs. G. That's a long time.
Capt. G. 'Think so? It's the shortest I can do with.
Mrs. G. You're getting quite clever.
Capt. G. I'm talking to you.
Mrs. G. How long?
Capt. G. A hundred and twenty years.
Capt. G. What does it matter so long as we are together now?
Mrs. G. And then it will be all gone. (Shivers.)
Mrs. G. I understand. Pip, will you tell me something?
Capt. G. Anything you like. (Aside.) I wonder what's coming now.
Capt. G. (Innocently.) Why not?
Mrs. G. You never wrote any for me! What happened?
Mrs. G. Did she care for you much?
Capt. G. No. At least she didn't show it as far as I remember.
Mrs. G. If you call me Mrs. Gadsby, p'raps I'll tell.
Mrs. G. No, you aren't, and I will tell--There was a man.
Capt. G. (Lightly.) Was there? Lucky man!
Mrs. G. (In a whisper.) And I thought I cared for him.
Capt. G. Still luckier man! Well?
Mrs. G. (Firmly.) 'Sha'n't go if you don't.
Mrs. G. Where do you bring that message from, my prophet?
Capt. G. Here! Because we care for each other. So it's all right.
Mrs. G. Like your first engagement.
Mrs. G. Not so very much, am I?
Capt. G. All this world and the next to me.
Capt. G. Yes, if it's not dreadful--about other men.
Mrs. G. It's about my own bad little self.
Capt. G. Then it must be good. Go on, dear.
Capt. G. By Jove, how do you know that?
Capt. G. So I have been led to believe.
Capt. G. But you asked to be told that, darling.
Mrs. G. Was there ever such nonsense talked before?
Mrs. G. Mind! It's not tuned. Ah! How that jars!
"Vanity, all is Vanity," said Wisdom. scorning me--
Vanity let it be!"
Capt. G. To play with. Do you mind, dear?
Mrs. G. Let me play too. I'd like it.
Mrs. G. What's skittles? Pah! What is this leather cleaned with?
Mrs. G. You want me to go?
Mrs. G. Everything you do interests me, Pip.
Capt. G. A cut--if you want to know.
Mrs. G. In action? Oh, Pip, and you never told me!
Capt. G. I'd forgotten all about it.
Mrs. G. Oh, don't, don't! That's enough!--Well, what happened?
Mrs. G. How? He's such a lazy man, I don't believe he did.
Capt. G. Darling, I'm always with you, aren't I?
Capt. G. And you have me surely, Sweetheart?
Mrs. G. I have not! Pip why don't you take me into your life?
Capt. G. More than I do? That would be difficult, dear.
Capt. G. And since when have I been treating you improperly?
Mrs. G. Always--and since the beginning. You know you have.
Capt. G. I don't; but I'm willing to be convinced.
Mrs. G. (Pointing to saddlery.) There!
Capt. G. How do you mean?
Mrs. G. Then why do you touch it?
Mrs. G. Why doesn't he pack them in a little trunk?
Mrs. G. But why need you bother about it? You're not a trooper.
Mrs. G. More than me?
Mrs. G. And that interests you?
Mrs. G. And am I only made to be amused?
Mrs. G. And that's why you wanted to send me away?
Mrs. G. Mafflin's better, then, isn't he?
Mrs. G. (At table.) I want to look - Do you keep accounts, Pip?
Mrs. G. (Her back to G.) What's that for?
Capt. G. (Aside.) It may turn her attention.
Mrs. G. Oh, that's enough. Don't go on!
Mrs. G. Why didn't you say No?
Capt. G. Yes, I suppose so.
Capt. G. (Aside.) Good old Jack! (Aloud.) Why, dear?
Capt. G. It comes to the same thing. You took it yourself.
CAPT. G. Bother the jam and the equipment! (Interlude.)
THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW Knowing Good and Evil.
DOCTOR. (Savagely.) Hsb, you little fool!
VOICE. (Mechanically.) It's me--it's Phil--it's your husband.
Capt. G. She doesn't know me!--It's your own husband, darling.
VOICE. Your own husband, darling.
Ayah. (With an inspiration.) Memsahib understanding all I saying.
Capt. G. Make her understand me then--quick!
VOICE. Salaem do. (Fretfully.) I know I'm not fit to be seen.
Ayah. (Aside to G.) Say "marneen" same as breakfash.
Capt. G. Good morning, little woman. How are we today?
Capt. G. Minnie! Minnie! It's me--you know me?
Capt. G. Say you know me! Only say you know me!
DOCTOR. She will before--Have I your leave to try?--
Capt. G. Oh, leave her in peace, Doc!
Capt. G. What? Go on, man.
DOCTOR. (In a whisper.) Forcing the last rally.
Capt. G. Then leave us alone.
VOICE. (Very faintly.) Pip, Pip dear.
Capt. G. I'm here, darling.
Capt. G. You--you aren't quite well.
VOICE. How funny! Have I been ill long?
Capt. G. Some days; but you'll be all right in a little time.
Capt. G. I d-d-on't know.
VOICE. They've cut it off. What a shame!
Capt. G. It must have been to make your head cooler.
VOICE. Just like a boy's wig. Don't I look horrid?
VOICE. I thought so. Why didn't you tell me that at first?
VOICE. That I am going to--die.
Capt. G. But you aren't! You sha'n't.
Capt. G. Hush, dear. You won't.
Capt. G. I wish I dared.
Capt. G. No! Anything but that, Min!
VOICE. Say that you'll always love me--until the end.
Capt. G. A little before the dawn, dear.
VOICE. I wonder where I shall be this time tomorrow?
Capt. G. Would you like to see the Padre?
Capt. G. Yes, dear.
Capt. G. I-I-I can't help it, dear.
Capt. G. Won't it tire you? 'Better not, perhaps.
"Minnie bakes oaten cake, Minnie brews ale,
And 'Are you sure the church-clock goes?' says she."
Capt. G. (Rising.) Doctor Sahib ko salaam do.
The dawn breaks as G. stumbles into the garden.
Mrs. G. I'll never do it again.
Mrs. G. That last terrible night.
CAPT. G. Then just you forget all about it.
Capt. G. I gave her fifty dibs.
Capt. M. rides up.
Capt. M, 'Cumbered about with cares of Khitmatgars? I fly.
Mrs. G. (Within.) Who's destroy mg my son's character?
Capt. M. You look awf'ly serious. Anything wrong?
Capt. G. Don't shout. I'm going to send in my papers.
Capt. M. You! Are you mad?
Capt. G. No--only married.
Capt. M. Does she say that she doesn't like India?
Capt. M. What are the Hills made for?
Capt. G. Not for my wife, at any rate.
Capt. M. Not lots, and they aren't some of Us.
Capt. G. Funk. That's the long and the short of it. Funk!
Capt. M. But what is there to funk?
Capt. G. Everything. It's ghastly.
Capt. M. Ah! I see.
You don't want to fight,
And by Jingo when we do,
You've got the kid, you've got the Wife,
You've got the money, too.
That's about the case, eh?
Capt. M. Oh, this is childish!
Capt. M. But, Gaddy, this is awful!
Capt. M. You never did!
Capt. G. I didn't care. It took the edge off him.
Capt. G. 'Tisn't her fault. Don't think that. It's all mine.
Capt. M. What does she say?
Capt. G. (Absently.) I say, do you despise me?
Capt. G. Thirty-three. I know it's--
Capt. G. (Limply.) This is rather more than a joke.
Capt. G. Regimental shop as usual.
"There's no tale in the wide world that I can't believe," I said.
Hans paused to puff at his cigar.
"And then?" said I.
"What be the man's crimes, Rajah Sahib?" said I.
"Cast him into jail," I said.
"You have my leave to go," said the king.
"He is an outlander," said the king. "Well done! Oh, well done!"
"Whence comest thou?" I asked, wondering.
"Dir hane mard-i-yemen dir To weeree ala gee,"
The standing army stood.
"And what is this shame, Namgay Doola?" I asked.
"By the god of my father, I cannot tell," said Namgay Doola.
"And who was thy father?"
"And thy father's name?" said I.
"May I see that god?"
"In a little while--at twilight time."
"Rememberest thou aught of thy father's speech?"
"Even so. And what was thy mother?"
"Dir bane mard-i-yemen dir To weeree ala gee."
"Which thou hast stolen," said I.
"But the sin of maiming the cow--consider that."
"Nay," said the king. "Why should I hurt the little children?"
The state groaned unanimously.
The king bowed his head, and I said:
I know that breed.
Has any one called?"
"Snakes?" I said down below.
I handed up the rod.
"Is it Imray?" I said.
Then we spoke both together and to ourselves:
"That's why he whispered about the house."
"Let's think it out somewhere else," I said.
"Excellent idea! Turn the lamps out. We'll get into my room."
"Call 'em in one by one," I said.
"What's your notion?" I asked.
"Come in," said Strickland. "It is a very warm night, isn't it?"
"And Imray Sahib went to Europe?"
"It is so said among the servants."
"And thou wilt take service with him when he returns?"
"What do I know of the ways of the white man, heaven-born?"
"Hast thou seen?" said Strickland, after a pause.
"Hang thee within a month! What else?"
"What said Imray Sahib?"
"Go!" said Strickland.
"I heard," I answered. "Imray made a mistake."
"What has befallen Bahadur Khan?" said I.
"And how much of the matter hast thou known?"
"Tietjens has come back to her room!"
He went to the planter, and "My mother's dead," said he, weeping.
"Who brought the news?" said the planter.
"The post," said Deesa.
Chihun snorted. Deesa wept and bellowed.
"But you, you fussy old pig, must stay behind and work."
Moti Guj trumpeted.
The planter was too astonished to be very angry.