The Guides at Cabul, 1879

SONS of the Island race, wherever ye dwell,

Who speak of your fathers' battles with lips that burn,

The deed of an alien legion hear me tell,

And think not shame from the hearts ye tamed to learn,

When succour shall fail and the tide for a season turn,

To fight with joyful courage, a passionate pride,

To die at last as the Guides of Cabul died.

For a handful of seventy men in a barrack of mud,

Foodless, waterless, dwindling one by one,

Answered a thousand yelling for English blood

With stormy volleys that swept them gunner from gun,

And charge on charge in the glare of the Afghan sun,

Till the walls were shattered wherein they couched at bay,

And dead or dying half of the seventy lay.

Twice they had taken the cannon that wrecked their hold,

Twice toiled in vain to drag it back,

Thrice they toiled, and alone, wary and bold,

Whirling a hurricane sword to scatter the rack,

Hamilton, last of the English, covered their track.

"Never give in!" he cried, and he heard them shout,

And grappled with death as a man that knows not doubt.

And the Guides looked down from their smouldering barrack again,

And behold, a banner of truce, and a voice that spoke:

"Come, for we know that the English all are slain,

We keep no feud with men of a kindred folk;

Rejoice with us to be free of the conqueror's yolk."

Silence fell for a moment, then was heard

A sound of laughter and scorn, and an answering word.

"Is it we or the lords we serve who have earned this wrong,

That ye call us to flinch from the battle they bade us fight?

We that live -- do ye doubt that our hands are strong?

They that are fallen -- ye know that their blood was bright!

Think ye the Guides will barter for lust of light

The pride of an ancient people in warfare bred,

Honour of comrades living, and faith to the dead?"

Then the joy that spurs the warrior's heart

To the last thundering gallop and sheer leap

Came on the men of the Guides: they flung apart

The doors not all their valour could longer keep;

They dressed their slender line; they breathed deep,

And with never a foot lagging or head bent

To the clash and clamour and dust of death they went.

The Gay Gordons

WHO'S for the Gathering, who's for the Fair?

(Gay goes the Gordon to a fight)

The bravest of the brave are at deadlock there,

(Highlanders! march! by the right!)

There are bullets by the hundred buzzing in the air,

There are bonny lads lying on the hillside bare;

But the Gordons know what the Gordons dare

When they hear the pipers playing!

The happiest English heart today

(Gay goes the Gordon to a fight)

Is the heart of the Colonel, hide it as he may;

(Steady there! steady on the right!)

He sees his work and he sees his way,

He knows his time and the word to say,

And he's thinking of the tune that Gordons play

When he sets the pipers playing.

Rising, roaring, rushing like the tide,

(Gay goes the Gordon to a fight)

They're up through the fire-zone, not be be denied;

(Bayonets! and charge by the right!

Thirty bullets straight where the rest went wide,

And thirty lads are lying on the bare hillside;

But they passed in the hour of the Gordons' pride,

To the skirl of the pipers' playing.

He Fell among Thieves

"YE have robb'd," said he, "ye have slaughter'd and made an end,

Take your ill-got plunder, and bury the dead:

What will ye more of your guest and sometime friend?"

"Blood for our blood," they said.

He laugh'd: "If one may settle the score for five,

I am ready; but let the reckoning stand til day:

I have loved the sunlight as dearly as any alive."

"You shall die at dawn," said they.

He flung his empty revolver down the slope,

He climb'd alone to the Eastward edge of the trees;

All night long in a dream untroubled of hope

He brooded, clasping his knees.

He did not hear the monotonous roar that fills

The ravine where the Yassin river sullenly flows;

He did not see the starlight on the Laspur hills,

Or the far Afghan snows.

He saw the April noon on his books aglow,

The wistaria trailing in at the window wide;

He heard his father's voice from the terrace below

Calling him down to ride.

He saw the gray little church across the park,

The mounds that hid the loved and honour'd dead;

The Norman arch, the chancel softly dark,

The brasses black and red.

He saw the School Close, sunny and green,

The runner beside him, the stand by the parapet wall,

The distant tape, and the crowd roaring between,

His own name over all.

He saw the dark wainscot and timber'd roof,

The long tables, and the faces merry and keen;

The College Eight and their trainer dining aloof,

The Dons on the daïs serene.

He watch'd the liner's stem ploughing the foam,

He felt her trembling speed and the thrash of her screw;

He heard the passengers' voices talking of home,

He saw the flag she flew.

And now it was dawn. He rose strong on his feet,

And strode to his ruin'd camp below the wood;

He drank the breath of the morning cool and sweet:

His murderers round him stood.

Light on the Laspur hills was broadening fast,

The blood-red snow-peaks chill'd to dazzling white;

He turn'd, and saw the golden circle at last,

Cut by the Eastern height.

"O glorious Life, Who dwellest in earth and sun,

I have lived, I praise and adore Thee." A sword swept.

Over the pass the voices one by one

Faded, and the hill slept.

Ionicus

WITH failing feet and shoulders bowed

Beneath the weight of happier days,

He lagged among the heedless crowd,

Or crept along suburban ways.

But still through all his heart was young,

A courage, a pride, a rapture, sprung

Of the strength and splendour of England's war.

From ill-requited toil he turned

To ride with Picton and with Pack,

Among his grammars inly burned

To storm the Afghan mountain-track.

When midnight chimed, before Quebec

He watched with Wolfe till he morning star;

At noon he saw from Victory's deck

The sweep and splendour of England's war.

Beyond the book his teaching sped,

He left on whom he taught the trace

Of kinship with the deathless dead,

And faith in all the Island race.

He passed : his life a tangle seemed,

His age from fame and power was far;

But his heart was night to the end, and dreamed

Of the sound and splendour of England's war.

The Dictionary of National Biography

SITTING at times over a hearth that burns

With dull domestic glow,

My thought, leaving the book, gratefully turns

To you who planned it so.

Not of the great only you deigned to tell, --

The stars by which we steer, --

But lights out of the night that flashed, and fell

To night again, are here.

Such as were those, dogs of an elder day,

Who sacked the golden ports,

And those later who dare grapple their prey

Beneath the harbour forts:

Some with flag at the fore, sweeping the world

To find an equal fight,

And some who joined war to their trade, and hurled

Ships of the line in flight.

Whether their fame centuries long should ring

They cared not over-much,

But cared greatly to serve God and the king,

And keep the Nelson touch;

And fought to build Britain above the tide

Of wars and windy fate;

And passed content, leaving to us the pride

Of lives obscurely great.

Laudabunt Alii

LET others praise, as fancy wills,

Berlin beneath her trees,

Or Rome upon her seven hills,

Or Venice by her seas;

Stamboul by double tides embraced,

Or green Damascus in the waste.

For me there's nought I would not leave

For the good Devon land,

Whose orchards down the echoing cleeve

Bedewed with spray-drift stand,

And hardly bear the red fruit up

That shall be next year's cider-cup.

You too, my friend, may wisely mark

How clean skies follow rain,

And, lingering in your own green park

Or drilled on Laffan's Plain,

Forget not with the festal bowl

To soothe at times your weary soul.

When Drake must bid to Plymouth Hoe

Good-bye for many a day,

And some were sad and feared to go,

And some that dared not stay,

Be sure he bade them broach the best,

And raised his tankard with the rest.

"Drake's luck to all that sail with Drake

For promised lands of gold!

Brave lads, whatever storms may break,

We've weathered worse of old!

To-night the loving-cup we'll drain,

To-morrow for the Spanish Main!"

The Vigil

ENGLAND! where the sacred flame

Burns before the inmost shrine,

Where the lips that love thy name

Consecrate their hopes and thine,

Where the banners of thy dead

Weave their shadows overhead,

Watch beside thine arms to-night,

Pray that God defend the Right.

Think that when to-morrow comes

War shall claim command of all,

Thou must hear the roll of drums,

Thou must hear the trumpet's call.

Now, before they silence ruth,

Commune with the voice of truth;

England! on thy knees to-night

Pray that God defends the Right.

Hast thou counted up the cost,

What to foeman, what to friend?

Glory sought is Honour lost,

How should this be knighthood's end?

Know'st thou what is Hatred's meed?

What the surest gain of Greed?

England! wilt thou dare to-night

Pray that God defend the Right?

So shalt thou when morning comes

Rise to conquer or to fall,

Joyful hear the rolling drums,

Joyful hear the trumpet's call.

Then let Memory tell thy heart

England! what thou wert, thou art!"

Gird thee with thine ancient might,

Forth! and God defend the Right!