章节正文
He doubled and broke for the hills again:
They had crippled his power for rapine and raid,
They had routed him out of his pet stockade,
And at last, they came, when the Day Star tired,
To a camp deserted -- a village fired.
A black cross blistered the Morning-gold,
And the body upon it was stark and cold.
The wind of the dawn went merrily past,
The high grass bowed her plumes to the blast.
And out of the grass, on a sudden, broke
A spirtle of fire, a whorl of smoke --
And Captain O'Neil of the Black Tyrone
Was blessed with a slug in the ulnar-bone --
The gift of his enemy Boh Da Thone.
(Now a slug that is hammered from telegraph-wire
Is a thorn in the flesh and a rankling fire.)
. . . . .
The shot-wound festered -- as shot-wounds may
In a steaming barrack at Mandalay.
The left arm throbbed, and the Captain swore,
"I'd like to be after the Boh once more!"
The fever held him -- the Captain said,
"I'd give a hundred to look at his head!"
The Hospital punkahs creaked and whirred,
But Babu Harendra (Gomashta) heard.
He thought of the cane-brake, green and dank,
That girdled his home by the Dacca tank.
He thought of his wife and his High School son,
He thought -- but abandoned the thought -- of a gun.
His sleep was broken by visions dread
Of a shining Boh with a silver head.
He kept his counsel and went his way,
And swindled the cartmen of half their pay.
. . . . .
And the months went on, as the worst must do,
And the Boh returned to the raid anew.
But the Captain had quitted the long-drawn strife,
And in far Simoorie had taken a wife.
And she was a damsel of delicate mould,
With hair like the sunshine and heart of gold,
And little she knew the arms that embraced
Had cloven a man from the brow to the waist:
And little she knew that the loving lips
Had ordered a quivering life's eclipse,
And the eye that lit at her lightest breath
Had glared unawed in the Gates of Death.
(For these be matters a man would hide,
As a general rule, from an innocent Bride.)
And little the Captain thought of the past,
And, of all men, Babu Harendra last.
. . . . .
But slow, in the sludge of the Kathun road,
The Government Bullock Train toted its load.
Speckless and spotless and shining with ~ghee~,
In the rearmost cart sat the Babu-jee.
And ever a phantom before him fled
Of a scowling Boh with a silver head.
Then the lead-cart stuck, though the coolies slaved,
And the cartmen flogged and the escort raved;
And out of the jungle, with yells and squeals,
Pranced Boh Da Thone, and his gang at his heels!
Then belching blunderbuss answered back
The Snider's snarl and the carbine's crack,
And the blitherevolver began to sing
To the blade that twanged on the locking-ring,
And the brown flesh blued where the bay'net kissed,
As the steel shot back with a wrench and a twist,
And the great white bullocks with onyx eyes
Watched the souls of the dead arise,
And over the smoke of the fusillade
The Peacock Banner staggered and swayed.
Oh, gayest of scrimmages man may see
Is a well-worked rush on the G.B.T.!
The Babu shook at the horrible sight,
And girded his ponderous loins for flight,
But Fate had ordained that the Boh should start
On a lone-hand raid of the rearmost cart,
And out of that cart, with a bellow of woe,
The Babu fell -- flat on the top of the Boh!
For years had Harendra served the State,
To the growth of his purse and the girth of his ~p]^et~.
There were twenty stone, as the tally-man knows,
On the broad of the chest of this best of Bohs.
And twenty stone from a height discharged
Are bad for a Boh with a spleen enlarged.
Oh, short was the struggle -- severe was the shock --
He dropped like a bullock -- he lay like a block;
And the Babu above him, convulsed with fear,
Heard the labouring life-breath hissed out in his ear.
And thus in a fashion undignified
The princely pest of the Chindwin died.
. . . . .
Turn now to Simoorie where, lapped in his ease,
The Captain is petting the Bride on his knees,
Where the ~whit~ of the bullet, the wounded man's scream
Are mixed as the mist of some devilish dream --
Forgotten, forgotten the sweat of the shambles
Where the hill-daisy blooms and the gray monkey gambols,
From the sword-belt set free and released from the steel,
The Peace of the Lord is with Captain O'Neil.
. . . . .
Up the hill to Simoorie -- most patient of drudges --
The bags on his shoulder, the mail-runner trudges.
"For Captain O'Neil, ~Sahib~. One hundred and ten
Rupees to collect on delivery."
Then
(Their breakfast was stopped while the screw-jack and hammer
Tore waxcloth, split teak-wood, and chipped out the dammer;)
Open-eyed, open-mouthed, on the napery's snow,
With a crash and a thud, rolled -- the Head of the Boh!
And gummed to the scalp was a letter which ran: --
"IN FIELDING FORCE SERVICE.
~Encampment~,
10th Jan.
"Dear Sir, -- I have honour to send, ~as you said~,
For final approval (see under) Boh's Head;
"Was took by myself in most bloody affair.
By High Education brought pressure to bear.
"Now violate Liberty, time being bad,
To mail V.P.P. (rupees hundred) Please add
"Whatever Your Honour can pass. Price of Blood
Much cheap at one hundred, and children want food;
"So trusting Your Honour will somewhat retain
True love and affection for Govt. Bullock Train,
"And show awful kindness to satisfy me,
I am,
Graceful Master,
Your
H. MUKERJI."
. . . . .
As the rabbit is drawn to the rattlesnake's power,
As the smoker's eye fills at the opium hour,
As a horse reaches up to the manger above,
As the waiting ear yearns for the whisper of love,
From the arms of the Bride, iron-visaged and slow,
The Captain bent down to the Head of the Boh.
And e'en as he looked on the Thing where It lay
'Twixt the winking new spoons and the napkins' array,
The freed mind fled back to the long-ago days --
The hand-to-hand scuffle -- the smoke and the blaze --
The forced march at night and the quick rush at dawn --
The banjo at twilight, the burial ere morn --
The stench of the marshes -- the raw, piercing smell
When the overhand stabbing-cut silenced the yell --
The oaths of his Irish that surged when they stood
Where the black crosses hung o'er the Kuttamow flood.
As a derelict ship drifts away with the tide
The Captain went out on the Past from his Bride,
Back, back, through the springs to the chill of the year,
When he hunted the Boh from Maloon to Tsaleer.
As the shape of a corpse dimmers up through deep water,
In his eye lit the passionless passion of slaughter,
And men who had fought with O'Neil for the life
Had gazed on his face with less dread than his wife.
For she who had held him so long could not hold him --
Though a four-month Eternity should have controlled him --
But watched the twin Terror -- the head turned to head --
The scowling, scarred Black, and the flushed savage Red --
The spirit that changed from her knowing and flew to
Some grim hidden Past she had never a clue to.
But It knew as It grinned, for he touched it unfearing,
And muttered aloud, "So you kept that jade earring!"
Then nodded, and kindly, as friend nods to friend,
"Old man, you fought well, but you lost in the end."
. . . . .
The visions departed, and Shame followed Passion: --
"He took what I said in this horrible fashion,
"~I'll~ write to Harendra!" With language unsainted
The Captain came back to the Bride. . .who had fainted.
. . . . .
And this is a fiction? No. Go to Simoorie
And look at their baby, a twelve-month old Houri,
A pert little, Irish-eyed Kathleen Mavournin --
She's always about on the Mall of a mornin' --
And you'll see, if her right shoulder-strap is displaced,
This: ~Gules~ upon ~argent~, a Boh's Head, ~erased!~
THE LAMENT OF THE BORDER CATTLE THIEF
O woe is me for the merry life
I led beyond the Bar,
And a treble woe for my winsome wife
That weeps at Shalimar.
They have taken away my long jezail,
My shield and sabre fine,
And heaved me into the Central jail
For lifting of the kine.
The steer may low within the byre,
The Jat may tend his grain,
But there'll be neither loot nor fire
Till I come back again.
And God have mercy on the Jat
When once my fetters fall,
And Heaven defend the farmer's hut
When I am loosed from thrall.
It's woe to bend the stubborn back
Above the grinching quern,
It's woe to hear the leg-bar clack
And jingle when I turn!
But for the sorrow and the shame,
The brand on me and mine,
I'll pay you back in leaping flame
And loss of the butchered kine.
They had crippled his power for rapine and raid,
They had routed him out of his pet stockade,
And at last, they came, when the Day Star tired,
To a camp deserted -- a village fired.
A black cross blistered the Morning-gold,
And the body upon it was stark and cold.
The wind of the dawn went merrily past,
The high grass bowed her plumes to the blast.
And out of the grass, on a sudden, broke
A spirtle of fire, a whorl of smoke --
And Captain O'Neil of the Black Tyrone
Was blessed with a slug in the ulnar-bone --
The gift of his enemy Boh Da Thone.
(Now a slug that is hammered from telegraph-wire
Is a thorn in the flesh and a rankling fire.)
. . . . .
The shot-wound festered -- as shot-wounds may
In a steaming barrack at Mandalay.
The left arm throbbed, and the Captain swore,
"I'd like to be after the Boh once more!"
The fever held him -- the Captain said,
"I'd give a hundred to look at his head!"
The Hospital punkahs creaked and whirred,
But Babu Harendra (Gomashta) heard.
He thought of the cane-brake, green and dank,
That girdled his home by the Dacca tank.
He thought of his wife and his High School son,
He thought -- but abandoned the thought -- of a gun.
His sleep was broken by visions dread
Of a shining Boh with a silver head.
He kept his counsel and went his way,
And swindled the cartmen of half their pay.
. . . . .
And the months went on, as the worst must do,
And the Boh returned to the raid anew.
But the Captain had quitted the long-drawn strife,
And in far Simoorie had taken a wife.
And she was a damsel of delicate mould,
With hair like the sunshine and heart of gold,
And little she knew the arms that embraced
Had cloven a man from the brow to the waist:
And little she knew that the loving lips
Had ordered a quivering life's eclipse,
And the eye that lit at her lightest breath
Had glared unawed in the Gates of Death.
(For these be matters a man would hide,
As a general rule, from an innocent Bride.)
And little the Captain thought of the past,
And, of all men, Babu Harendra last.
. . . . .
But slow, in the sludge of the Kathun road,
The Government Bullock Train toted its load.
Speckless and spotless and shining with ~ghee~,
In the rearmost cart sat the Babu-jee.
And ever a phantom before him fled
Of a scowling Boh with a silver head.
Then the lead-cart stuck, though the coolies slaved,
And the cartmen flogged and the escort raved;
And out of the jungle, with yells and squeals,
Pranced Boh Da Thone, and his gang at his heels!
Then belching blunderbuss answered back
The Snider's snarl and the carbine's crack,
And the blitherevolver began to sing
To the blade that twanged on the locking-ring,
And the brown flesh blued where the bay'net kissed,
As the steel shot back with a wrench and a twist,
And the great white bullocks with onyx eyes
Watched the souls of the dead arise,
And over the smoke of the fusillade
The Peacock Banner staggered and swayed.
Oh, gayest of scrimmages man may see
Is a well-worked rush on the G.B.T.!
The Babu shook at the horrible sight,
And girded his ponderous loins for flight,
But Fate had ordained that the Boh should start
On a lone-hand raid of the rearmost cart,
And out of that cart, with a bellow of woe,
The Babu fell -- flat on the top of the Boh!
For years had Harendra served the State,
To the growth of his purse and the girth of his ~p]^et~.
There were twenty stone, as the tally-man knows,
On the broad of the chest of this best of Bohs.
And twenty stone from a height discharged
Are bad for a Boh with a spleen enlarged.
Oh, short was the struggle -- severe was the shock --
He dropped like a bullock -- he lay like a block;
And the Babu above him, convulsed with fear,
Heard the labouring life-breath hissed out in his ear.
And thus in a fashion undignified
The princely pest of the Chindwin died.
. . . . .
Turn now to Simoorie where, lapped in his ease,
The Captain is petting the Bride on his knees,
Where the ~whit~ of the bullet, the wounded man's scream
Are mixed as the mist of some devilish dream --
Forgotten, forgotten the sweat of the shambles
Where the hill-daisy blooms and the gray monkey gambols,
From the sword-belt set free and released from the steel,
The Peace of the Lord is with Captain O'Neil.
. . . . .
Up the hill to Simoorie -- most patient of drudges --
The bags on his shoulder, the mail-runner trudges.
"For Captain O'Neil, ~Sahib~. One hundred and ten
Rupees to collect on delivery."
Then
(Their breakfast was stopped while the screw-jack and hammer
Tore waxcloth, split teak-wood, and chipped out the dammer;)
Open-eyed, open-mouthed, on the napery's snow,
With a crash and a thud, rolled -- the Head of the Boh!
And gummed to the scalp was a letter which ran: --
"IN FIELDING FORCE SERVICE.
~Encampment~,
10th Jan.
"Dear Sir, -- I have honour to send, ~as you said~,
For final approval (see under) Boh's Head;
"Was took by myself in most bloody affair.
By High Education brought pressure to bear.
"Now violate Liberty, time being bad,
To mail V.P.P. (rupees hundred) Please add
"Whatever Your Honour can pass. Price of Blood
Much cheap at one hundred, and children want food;
"So trusting Your Honour will somewhat retain
True love and affection for Govt. Bullock Train,
"And show awful kindness to satisfy me,
I am,
Graceful Master,
Your
H. MUKERJI."
. . . . .
As the rabbit is drawn to the rattlesnake's power,
As the smoker's eye fills at the opium hour,
As a horse reaches up to the manger above,
As the waiting ear yearns for the whisper of love,
From the arms of the Bride, iron-visaged and slow,
The Captain bent down to the Head of the Boh.
And e'en as he looked on the Thing where It lay
'Twixt the winking new spoons and the napkins' array,
The freed mind fled back to the long-ago days --
The hand-to-hand scuffle -- the smoke and the blaze --
The forced march at night and the quick rush at dawn --
The banjo at twilight, the burial ere morn --
The stench of the marshes -- the raw, piercing smell
When the overhand stabbing-cut silenced the yell --
The oaths of his Irish that surged when they stood
Where the black crosses hung o'er the Kuttamow flood.
As a derelict ship drifts away with the tide
The Captain went out on the Past from his Bride,
Back, back, through the springs to the chill of the year,
When he hunted the Boh from Maloon to Tsaleer.
As the shape of a corpse dimmers up through deep water,
In his eye lit the passionless passion of slaughter,
And men who had fought with O'Neil for the life
Had gazed on his face with less dread than his wife.
For she who had held him so long could not hold him --
Though a four-month Eternity should have controlled him --
But watched the twin Terror -- the head turned to head --
The scowling, scarred Black, and the flushed savage Red --
The spirit that changed from her knowing and flew to
Some grim hidden Past she had never a clue to.
But It knew as It grinned, for he touched it unfearing,
And muttered aloud, "So you kept that jade earring!"
Then nodded, and kindly, as friend nods to friend,
"Old man, you fought well, but you lost in the end."
. . . . .
The visions departed, and Shame followed Passion: --
"He took what I said in this horrible fashion,
"~I'll~ write to Harendra!" With language unsainted
The Captain came back to the Bride. . .who had fainted.
. . . . .
And this is a fiction? No. Go to Simoorie
And look at their baby, a twelve-month old Houri,
A pert little, Irish-eyed Kathleen Mavournin --
She's always about on the Mall of a mornin' --
And you'll see, if her right shoulder-strap is displaced,
This: ~Gules~ upon ~argent~, a Boh's Head, ~erased!~
THE LAMENT OF THE BORDER CATTLE THIEF
O woe is me for the merry life
I led beyond the Bar,
And a treble woe for my winsome wife
That weeps at Shalimar.
They have taken away my long jezail,
My shield and sabre fine,
And heaved me into the Central jail
For lifting of the kine.
The steer may low within the byre,
The Jat may tend his grain,
But there'll be neither loot nor fire
Till I come back again.
And God have mercy on the Jat
When once my fetters fall,
And Heaven defend the farmer's hut
When I am loosed from thrall.
It's woe to bend the stubborn back
Above the grinching quern,
It's woe to hear the leg-bar clack
And jingle when I turn!
But for the sorrow and the shame,
The brand on me and mine,
I'll pay you back in leaping flame
And loss of the butchered kine.
- counsel [´kaunsəl]
n.商议；劝告；律师 (初中英语单词) - damsel [´dæmzəl] n.姑娘，未婚少女 (初中英语单词)
- delicate [´delikət] a.精美的；微妙的 (初中英语单词)
- sunshine [´sʌnʃain] n.日光，阳光 (初中英语单词)
- innocent [´inəsənt] a.无罪的；单纯的 (初中英语单词)
- banner [´bænə] n.旗(帜)；头号标题 (初中英语单词)
- horrible [´hɔrəbəl] a.可怕的；恐怖的 (初中英语单词)
- height [hait] n.高度；顶点；卓越 (初中英语单词)
- severe [si´viə] a.严厉的；苛刻的 (初中英语单词)
- bullet [´bulit] n.子弹 (初中英语单词)
- monkey [´mʌŋki] n.猴子 v.乱弄；胡闹 (初中英语单词)
- bloody [´blʌdi] a.(流)血的；血腥的 (初中英语单词)
- pressure [´preʃə] n.压榨 vt.对...施压力 (初中英语单词)
- affection [ə´fekʃən] n.友爱；慈爱 (初中英语单词)
- rabbit [´ræbit] n.兔子，野兔 (初中英语单词)
- waiting [´weitiŋ] n.等候；伺候 (初中英语单词)
- whisper [´wispə] v.耳语 n.低语；沙沙声 (初中英语单词)
- twilight [´twailait] n.黎明；黄昏 (初中英语单词)
- passion [´pæʃən] n.激情；激怒；恋爱 (初中英语单词)
- terror [´terə] n.恐怖；惊骇 (初中英语单词)
- savage [´sævidʒ] a.野蛮的 n.蛮人 (初中英语单词)
- knowing [´nəuiŋ] a.会意的，心照不宣的 (初中英语单词)
- hidden [´hid(ə)n] hide 的过去分词 (初中英语单词)
- shield [ʃi:ld] n.盾牌；防御 v.保护 (初中英语单词)
- merrily [´merili] ad.欢乐地；愉快地 (高中英语单词)
- loving [´lʌviŋ] a.爱的，有爱情的 (高中英语单词)
- escort [´eskɔ:t] n.伴随者；警卫(队) (高中英语单词)
- jungle [´dʒʌŋgəl] n.丛林；杂乱的东西 (高中英语单词)
- peacock [´pi:kɔk] n.(雄)孔雀 vi.炫耀 (高中英语单词)
- bellow [´beləu] v.吼叫；轰鸣 (高中英语单词)
- approval [ə´pru:vəl] n.赞成，批准，认可 (高中英语单词)
- eternity [i´tə:niti] n.永恒，来世，无穷 (高中英语单词)
- fiction [´fikʃən] n.小说；虚构；谎言 (高中英语单词)
- lament [lə´ment] v.哀悼 n.哀悼；恸哭 (高中英语单词)
- stubborn [´stʌbən] a.顽固的；坚持的 (高中英语单词)
- blessed [´blesid] a.享福的；神圣的 (英语四级单词)
- revolver [ri´vɔlvə] n.左轮手枪；旋转者 (英语四级单词)
- wrench [rentʃ] n.&vt.拧；急拉；猛推 (英语四级单词)
- princely [´prinsli] a.王候般的；高贵的 (英语四级单词)
- violate [´vaiəleit] vt.违背；冒犯；侵害 (英语四级单词)
- manger [´meindʒə] n.槽；牛槽 (英语四级单词)
- corpse [kɔ:ps] n.尸体 (英语四级单词)
- jingle [´dʒiŋgəl] v.(使)叮当响 (英语四级单词)
- barrack [´bærək] n.兵营 vt.使驻兵营内 (英语六级单词)
- abandoned [ə´bændənd] a.被抛弃的；无约束的 (英语六级单词)
- phantom [´fæntəm] n.幽灵；幻影 a.幻想的 (英语六级单词)
- blithe [´blaið] a.快乐的；冒失的 (英语六级单词)
- ponderous [´pɔndərəs] a.沉重的；冗长的 (英语六级单词)
- devilish [´devəliʃ] a.魔鬼般的，凶恶的 (英语六级单词)
- trusting [´trʌstiŋ] a.信任的；相信的 (英语六级单词)
- piercing [´piəsiŋ] a.刺(贯)穿的；尖刻的 (英语六级单词)
- departed [di´pɑ:tid] a.已往的；已故的 (英语六级单词)
- treble [´trebəl] a.&n.三倍(重)的 (英语六级单词)
文章标签:名著
章节正文
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