Departmental Ditties and Barrack Room Ballads Part 8

The "captives of our bow and spear"

Are cheap--alas! as we are dear.

THE BETROTHED

"You must choose between me and your cigar."

--BREACH OF PROMISE CASE, CIRCA 1885.

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 s.p.a.ce; In the soft blue veil of the vapour musing on Maggie's face.

Maggie is pretty to look at--Maggie's a loving la.s.s, But the prettiest cheeks must wrinkle, the truest of loves must pa.s.s.

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-- But I could not throw away Maggie for fear o' the talk o' the town!

Maggie, my wife at fifty--grey and dour and old-- With never another Maggie to purchase for love or gold!

And the light of Days that have Been the dark of the Days that Are, And Love's torch stinking and stale, like the b.u.t.t of a dead cigar--

The b.u.t.t of a dead cigar you are bound to keep in your pocket-- With never a new one to light tho' it's charred and black to the socket!

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 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 Friends.h.i.+p 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.