Page:Rudyard Kipling's verse - Inclusive Edition 1885-1918.djvu/97

Rh And almost thinks himself the Government.)

O Youth, Youth, Youth! Forgive me, you're so young.

Forty from sixty—twenty years of work

And power to back the working. Ay de mi.

You want to know, you want to see, to touch

And, by your lights, to act. It's natural.

I wonder can I help you? Let me try.

You saw—what did you see from Bombay east?

Enough to frighten any one but me?

Neat that! It frightened Me in Eighty-Four!

You shouldn't take a man from Canada

And bid him smoke in powder-magazines;

Nor with the Reputation such as—Bah!

That ghost has haunted me for twenty years,

My Reputation now full-blown. Your fault!

Yours, with your stories of the strife at Home,

Who's up, who's down, who leads and who is led—

One reads so much, one hears so little here.

Well, now's your turn of exile. I go back

To Rome and leisure. All roads lead to Rome.

Or books—the refuge of the destitute.

When you ... that brings me back to India. See!

Start clear. I couldn't. Egypt served my turn.

You'll never plumb the Oriental mind,

And if you did, it isn't worth the toil.

Think of a sleek French priest in Canada;

Divide by twenty half-breeds. Multiply

By twice the Sphinx's silence. There's your East,

And you're as wise as ever. So am I.

Accept on trust and work in darkness, strike

At venture, stumble forward, make your mark,

(It's chalk on granite) then thank God no flame

Leaps from the rock to shrivel mark and man.

I'm clear—my mark is made. Three months of drouth

Had ruined so much. It rained and washed away

The specks that might have gathered on my Name.

I took a country twice the size of France,