Page:Departmental Ditties and Ballads and Barrack-Room Ballads, Kipling, 1899.djvu/234

50 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.