Departmental Ditties E-Book

Rudyard Kipling

• Herausgeber: Seltzer Books
• Kategorie: Poesie und Drama
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2018

Seitenzahl: 147

Beschreibung

Two volumes of verse in one file. According to Wikipedia: "Joseph Rudyard Kipling (1865 – 1936) was an English author and poet. Born in Bombay, British India (now Mumbai), he is best known for his works The Jungle Book (1894) and Rikki-Tikki-Tavi (1902), his novel, Kim (1901); his poems, including Mandalay (1890), Gunga Din (1890), If— (1910); and his many short stories, including The Man Who Would Be King (1888). He is regarded as a major "innovator in the art of the short story"; his children's books are enduring classics of children's literature; and his best works speak to a versatile and luminous narrative gift. Kipling was one of the most popular writers in English, in both prose and verse, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.[2] The author Henry James said of him: "Kipling strikes me personally as the most complete man of genius (as distinct from fine intelligence) that I have ever known." In 1907, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature, making him the first English language writer to receive the prize, and to date he remains its youngest recipient. Among other honours, he was sounded out for the British Poet Laureateship and on several occasions for a knighthood, all of which he declined.

Leseprobe

DEPARTMENTAL DITTIES AND BALLADS AND BARRACK ROOM BALLADS BY RUDYARD KIPLING

published by Samizdat Express, Orange, CT, USA

established in 1974, offering over 14,000  books

Books by Rudyard Kipling available from us:

Actions and Reactions

American Notes

Departmental Ditties and Ballads

Captains Courageous

The Day's Work

A Diversity of Creatures

France at War

Indian Tales

The Jungle Book

Just So Stories

Kim

Letters of Travel

Life's Handicap, Being Stories of Mine Own People

The Light that Failed

The Man Who Would Be King

Plain Tales from the Hills

Puck of Pook's Hill

Rewards and Fairies

Sea Warfare

The Second Jungle Book

Soldiers Three

Songs from Books

Stalky and Company

The Story of the Gadsby

Traffics and Discoveries

Under the Deodars

Verses

The Years Between

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VOLUME I: DEPARTMENTAL DITTIES AND OTHER VERSES

Departmental Ditties

General Summary

Army Headquarters

Study of an Elevation, in Indian Ink

A Legend of the Foreign Office

The Story of Uriah

The Post that Fitted

Public Waste

Delilah

What Happened

Pink Dominoes

The Man Who Could Write

Municipal

A Code of Morals

The Last Department

VOLUME II BALLADS AND BARRACK -ROOM BALLADS

The Ballad of Fisher’s Boarding-House

As The Bell Clinks

An Old Song

Certain Maxims of Hafiz

The Grave of The Hundred Head

The Moon of Other Days

The Overland Mail

What The People Said

The Undertaker’s Horse

The Fall of Jock Gillespie

Arithmetic on The Frontier

The Betrothed

A Tale of Two Cities

VOLUME III: BALLADS AND BARRACK-ROOM BALLADS

The Ballad of East and West

The Last Suttee

The Ballad of the King's Mercy

The Ballad of the King's Jest

The Ballad of Boh Da Thone

The Lament of the Border Cattle Thief

The Rhyme of the Three Captains

The Ballad of the "Clampherdown"

The Ballad of the "Bolivar"

The English Flag

Cleared

An Imperial Rescript

Tomlinson

Danny Deever

Tommy

Fuzzy-Wuzzv

Soldier, Soldier

Screw-Guns

Gunga Din

Oonts

Loot

"Snarleyow"

The Widow at Windsor

Belts

The Young British Soldier

Mandalay

Troopin'

Ford O' Kabul River

Route-Marchin'

VOLUME I: DEPARTMENTAL DITTIES AND OTHER VERSES

DEPARTMENTAL DITTIES

I have eaten your bread and salt,

   I have drunk your water and wine,

The deaths ye died I have watched beside,

   And the lives that ye led were mine.

Was there aught that I did not share

   In vigil or toil or ease,

One joy or woe that I did not know,

   Dear hearts across the seas?

I have written the tale of our life

   For a sheltered people's mirth,

In jesting guise--but ye are wise,

And ye know what the jest is worth.

GENERAL SUMMARY

We are very slightly changed

From the semi-apes who ranged

   India's prehistoric clay;

Whoso drew the longest bow,

Ran his brother down, you know,

   As we run men down today.

"Dowb," the first of all his race,

Met the Mammoth face to face

   On the lake or in the cave,

Stole the steadiest canoe,

Ate the quarry others slew,

   Died--and took the finest grave.

When they scratched the reindeer-bone

Someone made the sketch his own,

   Filched it from the artist--then,

Even in those early days,

Won a simple Viceroy's praise

   Through the toil of other men.

Ere they hewed the Sphinx's visage

Favoritism governed kissage,

Even as it does in this age.

Who shall doubt the secret hid

Under Cheops' pyramid

Was that the contractor did

   Cheops out of several millions?

Or that Joseph's sudden rise

To Comptroller of Supplies

Was a fraud of monstrous size

   On King Pharoah's swart Civilians?

Thus, the artless songs I sing

Do not deal with anything

   New or never said before.

As it was in the beginning,

Is today official sinning,

   And shall be forevermore.

ARMY HEADQUARTERS

Old is the song that I sing--

   Old as my unpaid bills--

Old as the chicken that kitmutgars bring

Men at dak-bungalows--old as the Hills.

Ahasuerus Jenkins of the "Operatic Own"

Was dowered with a tenor voice of super-Santley tone.

His views on equitation were, perhaps, a trifle queer;

He had no seat worth mentioning, but oh! he had an ear.

He clubbed his wretched company a dozen times a day,

He used to quit his charger in a parabolic way,

His method of saluting was the joy of all beholders,

But Ahasuerus Jenkins had a head upon his shoulders.

He took two months to Simla when the year was at the spring,

And underneath the deodars eternally did sing.

He warbled like a bulbul, but particularly at

Cornelia Agrippina who was musical and fat.

She controlled a humble husband, who, in turn, controlled a Dept.,

Where Cornelia Agrippina's human singing-birds were kept

From April to October on a plump retaining fee,

Supplied, of course, per mensem, by the Indian Treasury.

Cornelia used to sing with him, and Jenkins used to play;

He praised unblushingly her notes, for he was false as they:

So when the winds of April turned the budding roses brown,

Cornelia told her husband: "Tom, you mustn't send him down."

They haled him from his regiment which didn't much regret him;

They found for him an office-stool, and on that stool they set him,

To play with maps and catalogues three idle hours a day,

And draw his plump retaining fee--which means his double pay.

Now, ever after dinner, when the coffeecups are brought,

Ahasuerus waileth o'er the grand pianoforte;

And, thanks to fair Cornelia, his fame hath waxen great,

And Ahasuerus Jenkins is a power in the State.

STUDY OF AN ELEVATION, IN INDIAN INK

This ditty is a string of lies.

But--how the deuce did Gubbins rise?

POTIPHAR GUBBINS, C. E.,

Stands at the top of the tree;

And I muse in my bed on the reasons that led

To the hoisting of Potiphar G.

Potiphar Gubbins, C. E.,

Is seven years junior to Me;

Each bridge that he makes he either buckles or breaks,

And his work is as rough as he.

Potiphar Gubbins, C. E.,

Is coarse as a chimpanzee;

And I can't understand why you gave him your hand,

Lovely Mehitabel Lee.

Potiphar Gubbins, C. E.,

Is dear to the Powers that Be;

For They bow and They smile in an affable style

Which is seldom accorded to Me.

Potiphar Gubbins, C. E.,

Is certain as certain can be

Of a highly-paid post which is claimed by a host

Of seniors--including Me.

Careless and lazy is he,

Greatly inferior to Me.

What is the spell that you manage so well,

Commonplace Potiphar G.?

Lovely Mehitabel Lee,

Let me inquire of thee,

Should I have riz to what Potiphar is,

Hadst thou been mated to me?

A LEGEND

This is the reason why Rustum Beg,

Rajah of Kolazai,

Drinketh the "simpkin" and brandy peg,

Maketh the money to fly,

Vexeth a Government, tender and kind,

Also--but this is a detail--blind.

RUSTUM BEG of Kolazai--slightly backward native state

Lusted for a C. S. I.,--so began to sanitate.

Built a Jail and Hospital--nearly built a City drain--

Till his faithful subjects all thought their Ruler was insane.

Strange departures made he then--yea, Departments stranger still,

Half a dozen Englishmen helped the Rajah with a will,

Talked of noble aims and high, hinted of a future fine

For the state of Kolazai, on a strictly Western line.

Rajah Rustum held his peace; lowered octroi dues a half;

Organized a State Police; purified the. Civil Staff;

Settled cess and tax afresh in a very liberal way;

Cut temptations of the flesh--also cut the Bukhshi's pay;

Roused his Secretariat to a fine Mahratta fury,

By a Hookum hinting at supervision of dasturi;

Turned the State of Kolazai very nearly upside-down;

When the end of May was nigh, waited his achievement crown.

When the Birthday Honors came,

Sad to state and sad to see,

Stood against the Rajah's name nothing more than C. I. E.!

*   *   *   *   *

Things were lively for a week in the State of Kolazai.

Even now the people speak of that time regretfully.

How he disendowed the Jail--stopped at once the City drain;

Turned to beauty fair and frail--got his senses back again;

Doubled taxes, cesses, all; cleared away each new-built thana;

Turned the two-lakh Hospital into a superb Zenana;

Heaped upon the Bukhshi Sahib wealth and honors manifold;

Clad himself in Eastern garb--squeezed his people as of old.

Happy, happy Kolazai!  Never more  will Rustum Beg

Play to catch the Viceroy's eye. He prefers the "simpkin" peg.

THE STORY OF URIAH

"Now there were two men in one city;

the one rich and the other poor."

Jack Barrett went to Quetta

   Because they told him to.

He left his wife at Simla

   On three-fourths his monthly screw:

Jack Barrett died at Quetta

   Ere the next month's pay he drew.

Jack Barrett went to Quetta.

   He didn't understand

The reason of his transfer

   From the pleasant mountain-land:

The season was September,

   And it killed him out of hand.

Jack Barrett went to Quetta,

   And there gave up the ghost,

Attempting two men's duty

   In that very healthy post;

And Mrs. Barrett mourned for him

   Five lively months at most.

Jack Barrett's bones at Quetta

   Enjoy profound repose;

But I shouldn't be astonished

   If now his spirit knows

The reason of his transfer

   From the Himalayan snows.

And, when the Last Great Bugle Call

   Adown the Hurnal throbs,

When the last grim joke is entered

   In the big black Book of Jobs,

And Quetta graveyards give again

   Their victims to the air,

I shouldn't like to be the man

   Who sent Jack Barrett there.

THE POST THAT FITTED

    Though tangled and twisted the course of true love

 This ditty explains,

    No tangle's so tangled it cannot improve

 If the Lover has brains.

Ere the steamer bore him Eastward, Sleary was engaged to marry

An attractive girl at Tunbridge, whom he called "my little Carrie."

Sleary's pay was very modest; Sleary was the other way.

Who can cook a two-plate dinner on eight poor rupees a day?

Long he pondered o'er the question in his scantly furnished quarters--

Then proposed to Minnie Boffkin, eldest of Judge Boffkin's daughters.

Certainly an impecunious Subaltern was not a catch,

But the Boffkins knew that Minnie mightn't make another match.

So they recognised the business and, to feed and clothe the bride,

Got him made a Something Something somewhere on the Bombay side.

Anyhow, the billet carried pay enough for him to marry--

As the artless Sleary put it:--"Just the thing for me and Carrie."

Did he, therefore, jilt Miss Boffkin--impulse of a baser mind?

No! He started epileptic fits of an appalling kind.

[Of his modus operandi only this much I could gather:--

"Pears's shaving sticks will give you little taste and lots of lather."]

Frequently in public places his affliction used to smite

Sleary with distressing vigour--always in the Boffkins' sight.

Ere a week was over Minnie weepingly returned his ring,

Told him his "unhappy weakness" stopped all thought of marrying.

Sleary bore the information with a chastened holy joy,--

Epileptic fits don't matter in Political employ,--

Wired three short words to Carrie--took his ticket, packed his kit--

Bade farewell to Minnie Boffkin in one last, long, lingering fit.

Four weeks later, Carrie Sleary read--and laughed until she wept--

Mrs. Boffkin's warning letter on the "wretched epilept." . . .

Year by year, in pious patience, vengeful Mrs. Boffkin sits

Waiting for the Sleary babies to develop Sleary's fits.

PUBLIC WASTE

  Walpole talks of "a man and his price."

        List to a ditty queer--

  The sale of a Deputy-Acting-Vice-

        Resident-Engineer,

  Bought like a bullock, hoof and hide,

  By the Little Tin Gods on the Mountain Side.

By the Laws of the Family Circle 'tis written in letters of brass

That only a Colonel from Chatham can manage the Railways of State,

Because of the gold on his breeks, and the subjects wherein he must pass;

Because in all matters that deal not with Railways his knowledge is great.

Now Exeter Battleby Tring had laboured from boyhood to eld

On the Lines of the East and the West, and eke of the North and South;

Many Lines had he built and surveyed--important the posts which he held;

And the Lords of the Iron Horse were dumb when he opened his mouth.

Black as the raven his garb, and his heresies jettier still--

Hinting that Railways required lifetimes of study and knowledge--

Never clanked sword by his side--Vauban he knew not nor drill--

Nor was his name on the list of the men who had passed through the "College."

Wherefore the Little Tin Gods harried their little tin souls,

Seeing he came not from Chatham, jingled no spurs at his heels,

Knowing that, nevertheless, was he first on the Government rolls

For the billet of "Railway Instructor to Little Tin Gods on Wheels."

Letters not seldom they wrote him, "having the honour to state,"

It would be better for all men if he were laid on the shelf.

Much would accrue to his bank-book, an he consented to wait

Until the Little Tin Gods built him a berth for himself,

"Special, well paid, and exempt from the Law of the Fifty and Five,

Even to Ninety and Nine"--these were the terms of the pact:

Thus did the Little Tin Gods (long may Their Highnesses thrive!)

Silence his mouth with rupees, keeping their Circle intact;

Appointing a Colonel from Chatham who managed the Bhamo State Line

(The which was one mile and one furlong--a guaranteed twenty-inch gauge),

So Exeter Battleby Tring consented his claims to resign,

And died, on four thousand a month, in the ninetieth year of his age!

DELILAH

We have another viceroy now,--those days are dead and done

Of Delilah Aberyswith and depraved Ulysses Gunne.

Delilah Aberyswith was a lady--not too young--

With a perfect taste in dresses and a badly-bitted tongue,

With a thirst for information, and a greater thirst for praise,

And a little house in Simla in the Prehistoric Days.

By reason of her marriage to a gentleman in power,

Delilah was acquainted with the gossip of the hour;

And many little secrets, of the half-official kind,

Were whispered to Delilah, and she bore them all in mind.

She patronized extensively a man, Ulysses Gunne,

Whose mode of earning money was a low and shameful one.

He wrote for certain papers, which, as everybody knows,

Is worse than serving in a shop or scaring off the crows.

He praised her "queenly beauty" first; and, later on, he hinted

At the "vastness of her intellect" with compliment unstinted.

He went with her a-riding, and his love for her was such

That he lent her all his horses and--she galled them very much.

One day, THEY brewed a secret of a fine financial sort;

It related to Appointments, to a Man and a Report.

'Twas almost worth the keeping,--only seven people knew it--

And Gunne rose up to seek the truth and patiently pursue it.

It was a Viceroy's Secret, but--perhaps the wine was red--

Perhaps an Aged Councillor had lost his aged head--

Perhaps Delilah's eyes were bright--Delilah's whispers sweet--

The Aged Member told her what 'twere treason to repeat.

Ulysses went a-riding, and they talked of love and flowers;

Ulysses went a-calling, and he called for several hours;

Ulysses went a-waltzing, and Delilah helped him dance--

Ulysses let the waltzes go, and waited for his chance.

The summer sun was setting, and the summer air was still,

The couple went a-walking in the shade of Summer Hill.

The wasteful sunset faded out in Turkish-green and gold,

Ulysses pleaded softly, and-- that bad Delilah told!

Next morn, a startled Empire learnt the all-important news;

Next week, the Aged Councillor was shaking in his shoes.

Next month, I met Delilah and she did not show the least

Hesitation in affirming that Ulysses was a "beast."

 *   *   *   *   *

We have another Viceroy now, those days are dead and done--

Of Delilah Aberyswith and most mean Ulysses Gunne!

WHAT HAPPENED

Hurree Chunder Mookerjee, pride of Bow Bazaar,

Owner of a native press, "Barrishter-at-Lar,"

Waited on the Government with a claim to wear

Sabres by the bucketful, rifles by the pair.

Then the Indian Government winked a wicked wink,

Said to Chunder Mookerjee: "Stick to pen and ink.

They are safer implements, but, if you insist,

We will let you carry arms wheresoe'er you list."

Hurree Chunder Mookerjee sought the gunsmith and

Bought the tubes of Lancaster, Ballard, Dean, and Bland,

Bought a shiny bowie-knife, bought a town-made sword,

Jingled like a carriage-horse when he went abroad.

But the Indian Government, always keen to please,

Also gave permission to horrid men like these--

Yar Mahommed Yusufzai, down to kill or steal,

Chimbu Singh from Bikaneer, Tantia the Bhil;

Killar Khan the Marri chief, Jowar Singh the Sikh,

Nubbee Baksh Punjabi Jat, Abdul Huq Rafiq--

He was a Wahabi; last, little Boh Hla-oo

Took advantage of the Act--took a Snider too.

They were unenlightened men, Ballard knew them not.

They procured their swords and guns chiefly on the spot;

And the lore of centuries, plus a hundred fights,

Made them slow to disregard one another's rights.

With a unanimity dear to patriot hearts

All those hairy gentlemen out of foreign parts

Said: "The good old days are back--let us go to war!"

Swaggered down the Grand Trunk Road into Bow Bazaar,

Nubbee Baksh Punjabi Jat found a hide-bound flail;

Chimbu Singh from Bikaneer oiled his Tonk jezail;

Yar Mahommed Yusufzai spat and grinned with glee

As he ground the butcher-knife of the Khyberee.

Jowar Singh the Sikh procured sabre, quoit, and mace,