Lyra Heroica Part 49

XCV

_Tiresias and Other Poems_, 1885. By permission of Messrs.

Macmillan. Included at Lord Tennyson's own suggestion. For the n.o.ble feat of arms (25th October 1854) thus n.o.bly commemorated, see Kinglake (v. i. 102-66). 'The three hundred of the Heavy Brigade who made this famous charge were the Scots Greys and the second squadron of Enniskillings, the remainder of the "Heavy Brigade" subsequently das.h.i.+ng up to their support. The "three"

were Scarlett's aide-de-camp, Elliot, and the trumpeter, and Shegog the orderly, who had been close behind him.'--_Author's Note._

XCVI, XCVII

_The Return of the Guards, and other Poems_, 1866. By permission of Messrs. Macmillan. As to the first, which deals with an incident of the war with China, and is presumably referred to in 1860, 'Some Seiks and a private of the Buffs (or East Kent Regiment) having remained behind with the grog-carts, fell into the hands of the Chinese. On the next morning they were brought before the authorities and commanded to perform the _Ko tou_. The Seiks obeyed; but Moyse, the English soldier, declaring that he would not prostrate himself before any Chinaman alive, was immediately knocked upon the head and his body thrown upon a dunghill.'--Quoted by the author from _The Times_. The Elgin of line 6 is Henry Bruce, eighth Lord Elgin (1811-1863), then Amba.s.sador to China, and afterwards Governor-General of India. Compare _Theology in Extremis_ (_post_, p. 309). Of the second, which Mr. Saintsbury describes 'as one of the most lofty, insolent, and pa.s.sionate things concerning this matter that our time has produced,' Sir Francis notes that the incident--no doubt a part of the conquest of Sindh--was told him by Sir Charles Napier, and that 'Truckee' (line 12) = 'a stronghold in the Desert, supposed to be una.s.sailable and impregnable.'

XCVIII, XCIX

By permission of Messrs. Smith, Elder, and Co. _Dramatic Lyrics_, 1845; _Cornhill Magazine_, June 1871, and _Pacchiarotto_, 1876, Works, iv. and xiv. I can find nothing about Herve Riel.

C-CIII

The two first are from the 'Song of Myself,' _Leaves of Gra.s.s_ (1855); the others from _Drum Taps_ (1865). See _Leaves of Gra.s.s_ (Philadelphia, 1884), pp. 60, 62-63, 222, and 246.

CIV, CV

By permission of Messrs. Macmillan. Dated severally 1857 and 1859.

CVI

_Edinburgh Courant_, 1852. Compare _The Loss of the 'Birkenhead'_ in _The Return of the Guards, and other Poems_ (Macmillan, 1883), pp. 256-58. Of the troops.h.i.+p _Birkenhead_ I note that she sailed from Queenstown on the 7th January 1852, with close on seven hundred souls on board; that the most of these were soldiers--of the Twelfth Lancers, the Sixtieth Rifles, the Second, Sixth, Forty-third, Forty-fifth, Seventy-third, Seventy-fourth, and Ninety-first Regiments; that she struck on a rock (26th February 1852) off Simon's Bay, South Africa; that the boats would hold no more than a hundred and thirty-eight, and that, the women and children being safe, the men that were left--four hundred and fifty-four, all told--were formed on deck by their officers, and went down with the s.h.i.+p, true to colours and discipline till the end.

CVII-CIX

By permission of Messrs. Macmillan. From _Empedocles on Etna_ (1853). As regards the second number, it may be noted that Sohrab, being in quest of his father Rustum, to whom he is unknown, offers battle as one of the host of the Tartar King Afrasiab, to any champion of the Persian Kai Khosroo. The challenge is accepted by Rustum, who fights as a nameless knight (like Wilfrid of Ivanhoe at the Gentle and Joyous Pa.s.sage of Ashby), and so becomes the unwitting slayer of his son. For the story of the pair the poet refers his readers to Sir John Malcom's _History of Persia_. See _Poems_, by Matthew Arnold (Macmillan), i. 268, 269.

CX, CXI

_Ionica_ (Allen, 1891). By permission of the Author. _School Fencibles_ (1861) was 'printed, not published, in 1877.' _The Ballad for a Boy_, Mr. Cory writes, 'was never printed till this year.'

CXII

By permission of the Author. This ballad, which was suggested, Mr. Meredith tells me, by the story of Bendigeid Vran, the son of Llyr, in the _Mabinogion_ (iii. 121-9), is reprinted from _Modern Love_ (1862), but it originally appeared (_circ._ 1860) in _Once a Week_, a forgotten print the source of not a little unforgotten stuff--as _Evan Harrington_ and the first part of _The Cloister and the Hearth_.

CXIII

From the fourth and last book of _Sigurd the Volsung_, 1877.

By permission of the Author. Hogni and Gunnar, being the guests of King Atli, husband to their sister Gudrun, refused to tell him the whereabouts of the treasure of Fafnir, whom Sigurd slew; and this is the manner of their taking and the beginning of King Atli's vengeance.

CXIV

_English Ill.u.s.trated Magazine_, January 1890, and _Lyrical Poems_ (Macmillan, 1891). By permission of the Author: with whose sanction I have omitted four lines from the last stanza.

CXV

By permission of Sir Alfred Lyall. _Cornhill Magazine_, September 1868, and _Verses Written in India_ (Kegan Paul, 1889).

The second t.i.tle is: _A Soliloquy that may have been delivered in India, June 1857_; and this is further explained by the following 'extract from an Indian newspaper':--'They would have spared life to any of their English prisoners who should consent to profess Mahometanism by repeating the usual short formula; but only one half-caste cared to save himself that way.' Then comes the description, _Moriturus Loquitur_, and next the poem.

CXVI-CXVIII

From _Songs before Sunrise_ (Chatto and Windus, 1877), and the third series of _Poems and Ballads_ (Chatto and Windus, 1889). By permission of the Author.

CXIX, CXX

_The Complete Poetical Works of Bret Harte_ (Chatto and Windus, 1886). By permission of Author and Publisher. _The Reveille_ was spoken before a Union Meeting at San Francisco at the beginning of the Civil War and appeared in a volume of the Author's poems in 1867. _What the Bullet Sang_ is much later work: dating, thinks Mr. Harte, from '79 or '80.

CXXI

_St. James's Magazine_, October 1877, and _At the Sign of the Lyre_ (Kegan Paul, 1889). By permission of the Author.

CXXII

_St. James's Gazette_, 20th July 1888, and _Gra.s.s of Parna.s.sus_ (Longmans, 1888). By permission of Author and Publisher. Written in memory of Gordon's betrayal and death, but while there were yet hopes and rumours of escape.

CXXIII

_Underwoods_ (Chatto and Windus, 1886). By permission of the Publishers.

CXXIV

_Love's Looking-Gla.s.s_ (Percival, 1891). By permission of the Author.

CXXV

_Macmillan's Magazine_, November 1889. By permission of the Author. Kamal Khan is a Pathan; and the scene of this exploit--which, I am told, is perfectly consonant with the history and tradition of Guides and Pathans both--is the North Frontier country in the Peshawar-Kohat region, say, between Abazai and Bonair, behind which is stationed the Punjab Irregular Frontier Force--'the steel head of the lance couched for the defence of India.' As for the Queen's Own Corps of Guides, to the general 'G.o.d's Own Guides' (from its exclusiveness and gallantry), it comprehends both horse and foot, is recruited from Sikhs, Pathans, Rajputs, Afghans, all the fighting races, is officered both by natives and by Englishmen, and in all respects is worthy of this admirable ballad.