Rhymes of the East and Re-collected Verses   By: Unknown (1869-1952)

AND

Re collected Verses

BY D U M D U M

AUTHOR OF 'AT ODD MOMENTS' 'IN THE HILLS'

LONDON ARCHIBALD CONSTABLE AND COMPANY, LTD. 1905

TO

MY MOTHER

AUTHOR'S NOTE

Nearly all the verses that now make their first appearance in book form are reprinted from Punch , by kind permission of Messrs. Bradbury and Agnew. The rest I have taken from two little books that were published in Bombay during my last (and, I suppose, final) tour of service in India. They contained a good deal of work that was too local or topical in interest to stand reproduction, and especially the elder, which is out of print some that I would sooner bury than perpetuate. The rest I have overhauled, and included in this re collection.

Readers in, or of, India have been kind enough to regard my previous efforts with favour. I hope that this little volume will find them no less benevolently disposed, and that at the same time it may not be without interest to those whose knowledge of the Shiny East is derived from hearsay.

CONTENTS

NOCTURNE WRITTEN IN AN INDIAN GARDEN,

TO HIS PECULIAR FRIEND WITHIN DOORS,

VALEDICTION TO THE SS. 'ARABIA,' WHEN RETURNING WITH HER PASSENGERS FROM THE DELHI DURBAR,

A SOLDIER OF WEIGHT,

ODE TO THE TIME GUN OF GURRUMBAD,

OMAR OUT OF DATE,

ODE ON A DISTANT PROSPECT OF EVER GETTING TO THE HILLS,

A SOMBRE RETROSPECT,

TO MANDALAY GREETING,

SONG OF BELLS,

A BALLAD OF BUTTONRY,

THE IRON HAND,

THE WOOIN' O' TUMMAS,

CHRISTMAS GREETINGS,

'KAL!'

TO AN ELEPHANT,

VISIONARY, ON THE ADVANTAGES OF AN 'ASTRAL BODY,'

SUMMER PORTENTS, ELYSIUM,

TO MY LADY OF THE HILLS,

THE SHORES OF NOTHING,

THE LAST HOCKEY,

'FAREWELL'

A HAPPY NEW YEAR,

SAIREY,

ADAM,

ELEGY ON A RHINOCEROS,

IN SEVERAL KEYS. NO. 1 'MARIE,'

IN SEVERAL KEYS. NO. 2 THE BALLAD OF MORBID MOTHERS,

THE STORY OF RUD.,

THE HAPPY ENDING

STANZAS WRITTEN IN DEJECTION,

THE FINEST VIEW,

HAVEN,

NOCTURNE WRITTEN IN AN INDIAN GARDEN

'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, And seek the lawn for coolness and for ease.

Now spreads the gathering stillness like a pall, And melancholy silence rules the scene, Save where the bugler sounds his homing call, And thirsty THOMAS leaves the wet canteen;

Save that from yonder lines in deepest gloom Th' ambiguous mule does of the stick[1] bewail, Whose dunder craft forbids him to consume His proper blanket, or his neighbour's tail.

[Footnote 1: The dunder stick an ingenious instrument devised to defeat this extraordinary appetite.]

Beneath those jagged tiles, that low built roof (Whose inmost secret deeps let none divine!), Each to his master's cry supremely proof, The Aryan Brothers of our household dine.

Let not Presumption mock their joyless pile, The cold boiled rice, in native butter greased; Nor scorn, with rising gorge and painful smile, The cheap but filling flapjacks of the East.

Full many a gem of highest Art cuisine Those dark unfathomed dogmatists eschew; Full many a 'dish to set before the Queen' Would waste its sweetness on the mild Hindoo.