Works

Clothes and the Man I sing. Reformers, note
These of the Subaltern who owned a Coat.

He was what veterans miscall, for short,
By that objectionable term, a wart:[1]
...

After W. W.

An adventure of the Author's, and one designed to show that grievances may be met with in the cottages of the humblest, and may take the most unexpected forms.

...

11.30 P.M., DEC. 31


Friend, when the year is on the wing,
'Tis held a fair and comely thing
To turn reflective glances
Over the days' forbidden Scroll,
See if we're better on the whole,...

In the dim and distant ages, in the half-forgotten days,
Ere the East became the fashion and an Indian tour the craze,
Lived a certain Major-General, renowned throughout the State...

Long, long ago, in that heroic time
When I, a coy and modest youth, was shot
Out on this dust-heap of careers and crime
To try and learn what's what,

I had a servitor, a swarthy knave,...

Christmas comes but once a year.
Though by nature snappy,
Let us, as we may, appear
Merry, friend, and happy!
Buckle to; and when you meet your
Thunderstricken fellow-creature,...

Come, let us weep for Begum; he is dead.
Dead; and afar, where Thamis' waters lave
The busy marge, he lies unvisited,
Unsung; above no cypress branches wave,
Nor tributary blossoms fringe his grave;...

From the dust, and the drought, and the heat,
I am borne on the pinions of leave,
From the things that are bad to repeat
To the things that are good to receive.

From the glare of the day at its height...

'Farewell. What a subject! How sweet
It looks to the careless observer!
So simple; so easy to treat
With tenderness, mark you, and fervour.
Farewell. It's a poem; the song...

Here, in mine old-time harbourage installed,
Lulled by the murmurous hum of London's traffic
To that full calm which may be justly called
Seraphic,

I praise the gods; and vow, for my escape...

(=TO-MORROW)

['Never do To-day what can be postponed till To-morrow, save at the dictates of your personal convenience.' - Maxims of the Wicked, No. 3.]


Sweet Word, by whose unwearying assistance...

In Several Keys


We hear the opening refrain,
Marie!
We thought so; here you are again,
Marie!
A simple tune, in simple thirds,
Beloved of after-dinner birds;...

'Where ignorance is bliss,
'Tis folly to be wise.'


The time-gun rolls his nerve-destroying bray;
The toiling moon rides slowly o'er the trees;
The weary diners cast their cares away,...

After T. G.


Ye distant Hills, ye smiling glades,
In decent foliage drest,
Where green Sylvanus proudly shades
The Sirkar's haughty crest,
And ye, that in your wider reign...

[Time-guns are of invariable pattern and extreme antiquity. Other species come and go; their ancestor remains always. One is to be found in each cantonment: he generally occupies a position of unsheltered and pathetic lonelines...

BY A RENEGADE DISCIPLE


Wake! for Reveill'e scatters into flight
The flagging Rearguard of a ruined Night,
And hark! the meagre Champion of the Roost
Has flung a matins to the Throne of Light....

After A. C. S.


In Spring there are lashings of new books,
In Autumn fresh novels are sold,
They are many, but my shelf has few books,
My comrades, the favourites of old;...

Allons! Allons! Tra-la-la! Hear my Bellata!
Why do you not return to Mandalay O soldier?
Do you not remember the boats, and the paddles as they chunked outside the boats?...

Come, let us quaff the brimming cup
Of sorrow, bitterness, and pain;
For clearly, things are warming up
Again.

Observe with what awakened powers
The vulgar Sun resumes the right...

Why do you sit in the churchyard weeping?
Why do you cling to the dear old graves,
When the dim, drear mists of the dusk are creeping
Out of the marshes in wan, white waves?...