Page:Departmental Ditties and Ballads and Barrack-Room Ballads, Kipling, 1899.djvu/38

24 The artless Aide-de-camp was mute; the gilded Staff were still,

As, dumb with pent-up mirth, they booked that message from the hill;

For clear as summer-lightning flare, the husband's warning ran:—

"Don't dance or ride with General Bangs—a most immoral man."

[At dawn, across the Hurrum Hills, he flashed her counsel wise—

But, howsoever Love be blind, the world at large hath eyes.]

With damnatory dot and dash he heliographed his wife

Some interesting details of the General's private life.

The artless Aide-de-camp was mute; the shining Staff were still,

And red and ever redder grew the General's shaven gill.

And this is what he said at last (his feelings matter not):—

"I think we've tapped a private line. Hi! Threes about there! Trot!"