Griffen's Debt Full six miles down the valley. So we said But in the valley of the Gauri, men Mounted upon a monster-neighing horse, And fell upon the simple villagers With yells beyond the power of mortal throat. And smote them with the flail-like whip, and drove And generally cleared those villages. Then came the water, and the local God, And residue of homesteads, while they watched Upon his altar, and created priests, And blew into a conch, and banged a bell, So he, the whiskified Objectionable, Of all the Gauri valley villages; IN SPRINGTIME My garden blazes brightly with the rose-bush and the peach, And the koïl sings above it, in the siris by the well; From the creeper-covered trellis comes the squirrel's chattering speech, And the blue-jay screams and flutters where the cheery sat-bhai dwell. But the rose has lost its fragrance, and the koïl's note is strange; I am sick of endless sunshine, sick of blossom burdened bough. Give me back the leafless woodlands where the winds of Springtime range Give me back one day in England, for it 's Spring in England now! Through the pines the gusts are booming, o'er the brown fields blowing chill, From the furrow of the ploughshare streams the fragrance of the loam, And the hawk nests on the cliff-side and the jackdaw in the hill, And my heart is back in England mid the sights and sounds of Home. Kol: Nightingale. Siris: A forest tree, the acacia. Sat-bhai: A sort of thrush. But the garland of the sacrifice this wealth of rose and peach is; Ah! koil, little koil, singing on the siris bough, In my ears the knell of exile your ceaseless beil-like speech is Can you tell me aught of England or of Spring in England now? THE GALLEY SLAVE Oh, gallant was our galley from her cavern steering. wheel To her figurehead of silver and her beak of hammered steel; The leg-bar chafed the ankle, and we gasped for cooler air, But no galley on the water with our galley could compare ! Our bulkheads bulged with cotton, and our masts were stepped in gold We ran a mighty merchandise of niggers in the hold; The white foam spun behind us, and the black shark swam below, As we gripped the kicking sweep-head, and we made that galley go. It was merry in the galley, for we reveled now and then If they wore us down like cattle, faith, we fought and loved like men! As we snatched her through the water, so we snatched a minute's bliss, And the mutter of the dying never spoiled the lover's kiss. |