This will the fifty give me, asking nought in return, With only a Suttee"s pa.s.sion--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.
I will take no heed to their raiment, nor food for their mouths withal, So long as the gulls are nesting, so long as the showers fall.
I will scent "em with best vanilla, with tea will I temper their hides, And the Moor and the Mormon shall envy who read of the tale of my brides.
For Maggie has written a letter to give me my choice between The wee little whimpering Love and the great G.o.d 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 the gloom of my bachelor days is flecked with the cheery light Of stumps that I burned to Friendship and Pleasure and Work and Fight.
And I turn my eyes to the future that Maggie and I must prove, But the only light on the marshes is the Will-o"-the-Wisp of Love.
Will it see me safe through my journey or leave me bogged in the mire?
Since a puff of tobacco can cloud it, shall I follow the fitful fire?
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!
A TALE OF TWO CITIES
Where the sober-colored cultivator smiles On his byles; Where the cholera, the cyclone, and the crow Come and go; 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 Near a Bay-- 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 South and North Till the country from Peshawur to Ceylon Was his own.
Thus the midday halt of Charnock--more"s the pity!
Grew a City.
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 To the Hills.
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 To Darjeeling: 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.
The End * * * * * * * *
VOLUME II BALLADS AND BARRACK-ROOM BALLADS
BALLADS
THE BALLAD OF EAST AND WEST
Oh, East is East, and West is West, and never the twain shall meet, Till Earth and Sky stand presently at G.o.d"s great Judgment Seat; But there is neither East nor West, Border, nor Breed, nor Birth, When two strong men stand face to face, 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: He has lifted her out of the stable-door between the dawn and the day, And turned the calkins upon her feet, and ridden her far away.
Then up and spoke the Colonel"s son that led a troop of the Guides: "Is there never a man of all my men can say where Kamal hides?"
Then up and spoke Mahommed Khan, the son of the Ressaldar: "If ye know the track of the morning-mist, ye know where his pickets are.
"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, By the favour of G.o.d ye may cut him off ere he win to the Tongue of Jagai.
"But if he be past the Tongue of Jagai, right swiftly turn ye then, For the length and the breadth of that grisly plain is sown with Kamal"s men.
There is rock to the left, and rock to the right, and low lean thorn between, And ye may hear a breech-bolt snick where never a man is seen."
The Colonel"s son has taken a horse, and a raw rough dun was he, With the mouth of a bell and the heart of h.e.l.l and the head of the gallows- tree.
The Colonel"s son to the Fort has won, they bid him stay to eat-- Who rides at the tail of a Border thief, he sits not long at his meat.
He"s up and away from Fort Bukloh as fast as he can fly, Till he was aware of his father"s mare in the gut of the Tongue of Jagai, Till he was aware of his father"s mare with Kamal upon her back, And when he could spy the white of her eye, he made the pistol crack.