Page:Departmental Ditties and Ballads and Barrack-Room Ballads, Kipling, 1899.djvu/226

42 Till the sun-dried boys of the Black Tyrone

Took a brotherly interest in Boh Da Thone:

And, sooth, if pursuit in possession ends,

The Boh and his trackers were best of friends.

The word of a scout—a march by night—

A rush through the mist—a scattering fight—

A volley from cover—a corpse in the clearing—

The glimpse of a loin-cloth and heavy jade earring—

The flare of a village—the tally of slain—

And ... the Boh was abroad "on the raid" again!

They cursed their luck as the Irish will,

They gave him credit for cunning and skill,

They buried their dead, they bolted their beef,

And started anew on the track of the thief

Till, in place of the "Kalends of Greece," men said,

"When Crook and his darlings come back with the head."

They had hunted the Boh from the Hills to the plain—

He doubled and broke for the hills again: