Part 16

She will need no half-mast signal, minute-gun, or rocket-flare, When the cry for help goes seaward, she will find her servants there. Battered chain-gangs of the orlop, grizzled drafts of years gone by, To the bench that broke their manhood, they shall lash themselves and die.

Hale and crippled, young and aged, paid, deserted, shipped away-- Palace, cot, and lazaretto shall make up the tale that day, When the skies are black above them, and the decks ablaze beneath, And the topmen clear the raffle with their clasp-knives in their teeth.

It may be that Fate will give me life and leave to row once more-- Set some strong man free for fighting as I take awhile his oar. But to-day I leave the galley. Shall I curse her service then? God be thanked--whate’er comes after, I have lived and toiled with Men!

_Rudyard Kipling._

VII

SOUTH AFRICA

PRINGLE

CCXIII

THE DESOLATE VALLEY

Far up among the forest-belted mountains, Where Winterberg, stern giant old and grey, Looks down the subject dells, whose gleaming fountains To wizard Kat their virgin tribute pay, A valley opens to the noontide ray, With green savannahs shelving to the brim Of the swift river, sweeping on its way To where Umtóka tries to meet with him, Like a blue serpent gliding through the acacias dim.

There, couched at night in hunter’s wattled shieling, How wildly-beautiful it was to hear The elephant his shrill _reveillé_ pealing, Like some far signal-trumpet on the ear! While the broad midnight moon was shining clear, How fearful to look forth upon the woods, And see those stately forest-kings appear, Emerging from their shadowy solitudes-- As if that trump had woke Earth’s old gigantic broods!

Look round that vale! behold the unburied bones Of Ghona’s children withering in the blast! The sobbing wind, that through the forest moans, Whispers--‘The spirit hath for ever passed!’ Thus, in the vale of desolation vast, In moral death dark Afric’s myriads lie; But the appointed day shall dawn at last, When, breathed on by a spirit from on high, The dry bones shall awake, and shout-- ‘Our God is nigh!’

_Thomas Pringle._

COURTHOPE

CCXIV

ENGLAND IN SOUTH AFRICA

(1899)

Across the streaming flood, the deep ravine, Through hurricanes of shot, through hells of fire, To rocks where myriad marksmen lurk unseen, The steadfast legions mount, mount always higher.

Earth and her elements protect the foe: His are the covered trench, the ambushed hill, The treacherous pit, the sudden secret blow, The swift retreat--but ours the conquering will.

Against that will in vain the fatal lead, Vain is the stubborn heart, brute cunning vain: Strong in the triumphs of thy dauntless dead, Advance, Imperial Race, advance and reign!

_William John Courthope._

HENLEY

CCXV

FOR A GRAVE IN SOUTH AFRICA

We cheered you forth--brilliant and kind and brave, Under your country’s triumphing flag you fell; It floats, true heart, over no dearer grave. Brave and brilliant and kind, hail and farewell!

_William Ernest Henley._

HALL

CCXVI

ON LEAVING TABLE BAY

Sun-showered land! largess of golden light Is thine; and well-befitting since the night Of England voiced again Canute’s command; ah, not in vain! Backward the tides of savagery drew; And still the bright sands gain On the retreating main: A lost world leaping to the light and blue.

In state the mountains greet an eve so fair, And sunset-crowns and robes of purple wear: A sea of glass the ocean, gold-inwrought-- Pathway apocalyptic. From the prow A long bright ripple to the land is roll’d.... Haste thee and tell, tell of our love, with lips of gold, In soft sea-music tell! And thou, sweet bird, whose snowy wings have caught The universal glory, carry thou To that dear shore farewell--our hearts’ farewell!

_Arthur Vine Hall._

COOK

CCXVII

THE RELIEF OF MAFEKING

‘Well done!’ The cry goes ringing round the world, O’er land and sea, wherever pulse throbs fast At tales of courage, for relief at last Is theirs and ours: so dawn’s bright flag unfurled Hath challenge to the powers of darkness hurled, And made one glory of the empyrean vast; And when this day to history’s tome is passed Its name shall stand on golden page impearled.

O God! our Help, our Hope, our Refuge strong In days of trouble, still be Thou our Guide; So shall we pass the coming days along In certain trust whatever may betide, And on Thine Empire shine the glorious sun Till at last Thou say to her ‘Well done!’

_Hilda Mary Agnes Cook._

RUSSELL

CCXVIII

THE VANGUARD

(1842)

By the Boer lines at Congella, Where the west wind sheds its rain, All the yellow sands grew crimson With the wounded and the slain.

Etched upon the deadly sky-line, Mark for guns behind each dune, Flashed the silver of the bayonets In the lethal night’s high noon.

Far across the bay the booming Of the cannon rose and fell; Echoing to bluff and island, Rang the soldier’s passing-bell.

Blood of England shed for Empire At our southern Trasimene-- Such it is that fosters heroes, Keeps the graves of valour green.

All life’s nobler thoughts are strengthened By the valiance of our sires, As it glows undimmed, undying, Like Rome’s cherished vestal-fires.

Ever burning--happy omen For the progress of the State! Patriots give their lives as incense On the altars reared by Fate.

Such pure light streamed o’er the cities Of the pulsing Punic world; Lit their galleys through the Pillars Of the West, with sails unfurled.

In wild camps it thrilled Rome’s legions, Stemmed the East at Marathon; Bore sea-heroes through the Syrtes, Through strange seas and tropic dawn.

Diaz and Da Gama snatched it From their Lusitanian pyre; Bore it over hungry surges To the Cape of Storms and Fire;

And it gleamed upon our verdure From their storm-vexed caravel-- Band of afternoon undying-- O’er tired visions cast its spell.

Clear the deathless flame was glowing By the wide bay’s tender blue, When their blood was shed for England By the men of ’Forty-two.

_Robert Russell._

VIII

AUSTRALIA

SUPPLE

CCXIX

DAMPIER’S DREAM

The seaman slept--all nature sleeps; a sacred stillness there Is on the wood--is on the waves--is in the silver air. The sky above--the silent sea--with stars were all aglow; There shone Orion and his belt--Arcturus and his bow! The seaman slept--or does he sleep?--what chorus greets him now?-- Wild music breaking from the deep around the vessel’s bow? He starts, he looks, he sees rise shadowy--can he only dream? A sovereign form, wrathful, yet beauteous--in the moon’s cold beam!

‘Mortal, hath fallen my star in the hour Of the dread eclipse, that thou scornest my power? Herald thus soon of that mystic race Fated to reign in my people’s place, Bringing arts of might--working wondrous spells Where now but the simple savage dwells; Before whom my children shall pass away, As the morntide passes before the day. The time is not yet, why dost thou come, The bale of thy presence to cast o’er my home? Its shadow of doom is on air and waves-- E’en the still soft gloom of my deep sea caves A shudder has reached; over shore and bay Bodeful the shivering moonbeams play! The Spirit of this zone am I-- Mine are the isles and yon mainlands nigh; And roused from my rest by the wood-wraith’s sigh, And the sea-maid’s moan on the coral reef-- Voices never till now foreboding grief-- Hither I fly-- Here at the gate of my South Sea realm To bid thee put back thy fateful helm! Not yet is the hour, why art thou here Presaging dole, and scaith, and fear?’

Not yet is the time-- Woe-bringer, go back to thy cloud-wrapped clime! Meeter for thee the drear Northern sky, And where wintry breakers ceaseless roar, And strew with wrecks a dusky shore; Where the iceberg rears its awful form, Where along the billows the petrels cry-- For, like thee, that dark bird loves the storm! Thou child of the clime of the Vikings wild-- Who wert nursed upon the tempest’s wing, A boy on the wind-beaten mast to cling-- Whose quest is prey, who hailest the day When gleam the red swords and the death-bolts ring! Thy joy is with restless men and seas, What dost thou in scenes as soft as these?

The hour is not yet, but the doom appears As I gaze thro’ the haze of long distant years. A mighty people speaking thy tongue, Sea-borne from their far, dark strands Shall spread abroad over all these lands Where man now lives as when Time was young. I see their stately cities rise Thro’ the clouds where the future’s horizon lies; Thro’ the purple mists shrouding river and plain, Where the white-foaming bay marks the hidden main; And clearer now--I behold more clear Great ships--sails swelling to the breeze, Their keels break all the virgin seas; Vast white-winged squadrons, they come and go Where only has skimmed the light canoe! Yes, the seats and the paths of empire veer, A highway of nations will yet be here! As Tyre was in an ancient age; As Venice of palaces, strong and sage; As the haughty ports of your native shore Whose fleets override the waters’ rage, So shall the pride of yon cities soar. From the frigid Pole to the torrid Line, Their sway shall stretch--their standards shine!’

_Gerald Henry Supple._

GORDON

CCXX

BY FLOOD AND FIELD

I remember the lowering wintry morn, And the mist on the Cotswold hills, Where I once heard the blast of the huntsman’s horn, Not far from the seven rills. Jack Esdale was there, and Hugh St. Clair, Bob Chapman, and Andrew Kerr, And big George Griffiths on Devil-May-Care, And--black Tom Oliver. And one who rode on a dark brown steed, Clean-jointed, sinewy, spare, With the lean game head of the Blacklock breed, And the resolute eye that loves the lead, And the quarters massive and square-- A tower of strength, with a promise of speed (There was Celtic blood in the pair).

I remember how merry a start we got, When the red fox broke from the gorse, In a country so deep, with a scent so hot, That the hound could outpace the horse; I remember how few in the front rank show’d, How endless appeared the tail, On the brown hillside, where we cross’d the road And headed towards the vale. The dark brown steed on the left was there, On the right was a dappled grey, And between the pair on a chestnut mare The duffer who writes this lay. What business had ‘this child’ there to ride? But little or none at all; Yet I hold my own for awhile in the pride That goeth before a fall. Though rashness can hope but for one result, We are heedless when fate draws nigh us, And the maxim holds good, ‘_Quem perdere vult Deus dementat prius_.’

The right-hand man to the left-hand said, As down in the vale we went, ‘Harden your heart like a millstone, Ned, And set your face as flint; Solid and tall is the rasping wall That stretches before us yonder; You must have it at speed or not at all, ’Twere better to halt than to ponder; For the stream runs wide on the take off side, And washes the clay bank under; Here goes for a pull, ’tis a madman’s ride, And a broken neck if you blunder!’

No word in reply his comrade spoke, Nor waver’d, nor once look’d round, But I saw him shorten his horse’s stroke As we splash’d through the marshy ground; I remember the laugh that all the while On his quiet features played:-- So he rode to his death, with that careless smile, In the van of the Light Brigade; So stricken by Russian grape, the cheer Rang out while he toppled back, From the shattered lungs as merry and clear As it did when it roused the pack. Let never a tear his memory stain, Give his ashes never a sigh, One of the many who fell--not in vain-- A TYPE OF OUR CHIVALRY!

I remember one thrust he gave to his hat, And two to the flanks of the brown, And still as a statue of old he sat, And he shot to the front, hands down; I remember the snort and the stag-like bound Of the steed six lengths to the fore, And the laugh of the rider while, landing sound, He turned in his saddle and glanced around; I remember--but little more, Save a bird’s-eye gleam of the dashing stream, A jarring thud on the wall, A shock, and the blank of a nightmare’s dream,-- I was down with a stunning fall!

_Adam Lindsay Gordon._

STEPHENS

CCXXI

FULFILMENT

(_January 1, 1901_)

Ah, now we know the long delay But served to assure a prouder day, For while we waited, came the call To prove and make our title good-- To face the fiery ordeal That tries the claim to Nationhood-- And now, in pride of challenge, we unroll, For all the world to read, the record-scroll Whose bloody script attests a Nation’s soul.

O ye, our Dead, who at the call Fared forth to fall as heroes fall, Whose consecrated souls we failed To note beneath the common guise Till all-revealing Death unveiled The splendour of your sacrifice, Now, crowned with more than perishable bays, Immortal in your country’s love and praise, Ye too have portion in this day of days!

And ye who sowed where now we reap, Whose waiting eyes, now sealed in sleep, Beheld far off with prescient sight This triumph of rejoicing lands-- Yours too the day! for though its light Can pierce not to your folded hands, These shining hours of advent but fulfil The cherished purpose of your constant will Whose onward impulse liveth in us still.

Still lead thou vanward of our line Who, shaggy, massive, leonine, Couldst yet most finely phrase the event-- For if a Pisgah view was all Vouchsafed to thine uncrowned intent, The echoes of thy herald-call Not faintlier strive with our saluting guns, And at thy words through all Australia’s sons The ‘crimson thread of kinship’ redder runs.

But not the memory of the dead, How loved soe’er each sacred head, To-day can change from glad to grave The chords that quire a Nation born-- Twin-offspring of the birth that gave, When yester-midnight chimed to morn, Another age to the Redeemer’s reign, Another cycle to the widening gain Of Good o’er Ill and Remedy o’er Pain.

Our sundering lines with love o’ergrown, Our bounds the girdling seas alone-- Be this the burden of the psalm That every resonant hour repeats, Till day-fall dusk the fern and palm That forest our transfigured streets, And night still vibrant with the note of praise Thrill brotherhearts to song in woodland ways, When gum-leaves whisper o’er the camp-fire’s blaze.

* * * * *

The Charter’s read; the rites are o’er; The trumpet’s blare and cannon’s roar Are silent, and the flags are furled; But not so ends the task to build Into the fabric of the world The substance of our hope fulfilled-- To work as those who greatly have divined The lordship of a continent assigned As God’s own gift for service of mankind.

O People of the onward will, Unit of Union greater still Than that to-day hath made you great, Your true Fulfilment waiteth there, Embraced within the larger fate Of Empire ye are born to share-- No vassal progeny of subject brood, No satellite shed from Britain’s plenitude, But orbed with _her_ in one wide sphere of good!

_James Brunton Stephens._

RUSSELL

CCXXII

THE BIRTH OF AUSTRALIA

Not ’mid the thunder of the battle guns, Not on the red field of an Empire’s wrath, Rose to a nation Australasia’s sons, Who trod to greatness Industry’s pure path. Behold a people through whose annals runs No damning stain of falsehood, force or wrong,-- A record clear as light, and sweet as song, Without one page the patriot’s finger shuns! Where ’mid the legends of old Rome, or Greece, Glows such a tale? Thou canst not answer, Time! With shield unsullied by a single crime, With wealth of gold and still more golden fleece, Forth stands Australia, in her birth sublime,-- The only nation from the womb of Peace!

_Percy Russell._

LAWSON

CCXXIII

THE WAR OF THE FUTURE

There are boys to-day in the city slum and the home of wealth and pride Who’ll have one home when the storm is come, and fight for it side by side, Who’ll hold the cliffs ’gainst the armoured hells that batter a coasted town, Or grimly die in a hail of shells when the walls come crashing down; And many a pink-white baby girl, the queen of her home to-day, Shall see the wings of the tempest whirl the mist of our dawn away-- Shall live to shudder and stop her ears to the thud of the distant gun, And know the sorrow that has no tears when a battle is lost or won,-- As a mother or wife, in the years to come, will kneel, mild-eyed and white, And pray to God in her darkened home for the ‘men in the fort to-night.’

But, O! if the cavalry charge again as they did when the world was wide, ’Twill be grand in the ranks of a thousand men in that glorious race to ride, And strike for all that is true and strong, for all that is grand and brave, And all that ever shall be, so long as man has a soul to save.

He must lift the saddle, and close his ‘wings,’ and shut his angels out, And steel his heart for the end of things, who’d ride with the stockman scout, When the race is rode on the battle track, and the waning distance hums, And the shelled sky shrieks or the rifles crack like stockwhips amongst the gums-- And the ‘straight’ is reached, and the field is ‘gapped,’ and the hoof-torn sward grows red With the blood of those who are handicapped with iron and steel and lead; And the gaps are filled, though unseen by eyes, with the spirit and with the shades Of the world-wide rebel dead who’ll rise and rush with the Bush Brigades.

All creeds and trades will have soldiers there--give every class its due-- And there’ll be many a clerk to spare for the pride of the jackeroo. They’ll fight for honour, and fight for love, and a few will fight for gold, For the devil below, and for God above, as our fathers fought of old; And some half-blind with exultant tears, and some stiff-lipped, stern-eyed, For the pride of a thousand after-years and the old eternal pride. The soul of the world they will feel and see in the chase and the grim retreat-- They’ll know the glory of victory--and the grandeur of defeat.

They’ll tell the tales of the ‘nights before’ and the tales of the ship and fort, Till the sons of Australia take to war as their fathers took to sport, Their breath come deep and their eyes grow bright at the tales of chivalry, And every boy will want to fight, no matter what cause it be-- When the children run to the doors and cry, ‘O, mother, the troops are come!’ And every heart in the town leaps high at the first loud thud of the drum. They’ll know, apart from its mystic charm, what music is at last, When, proud as a boy with a broken arm, the regiment marches past; And the veriest wreck in the drink-fiend’s clutch, no matter how low or mean, Will feel, when he hears the march, a touch of the man he might have been. And fools, when the fiends of war are out and the city skies aflame, Will have something better to talk about than a sister’s or brother’s shame, Will have something nobler to do by far than to jest at a friend’s expense, Or to blacken a name in a public bar or over a backyard fence. And this you learn from the libelled past (though its methods were somewhat rude), _A nation’s born when the shells fall fast, or its lease of life renewed;-- We in part atone for the ghoulish strife--for the crimes of the peace we boast-- And the better part of a people’s life in the storm comes uppermost_.

_Henry Lawson._

MAQUARIE

CCXXIV

A FAMILY MATTER

Come, my hearties--work will stand-- Here’s your Mother calling!-- Wants us all to lend a hand, And go out Uncle-Pauling. Catch your nags, and saddle slick, Quick to join the banners! Folks that treat the fam’ly thick Must be taught their manners.

Who would potter round a farm Fearful of clubbed gunstroke, And, keeping cosy out of harm, Die of loafer’s sunstroke? Gusts of distant battle-noise Tell that men are falling; Get your guns, my bonny boys, Here’s your Mother calling!

Buckle on your cartridge belts, Waste no time about it! Force is massing on the veldts, We must off and rout it. What if fate should work its worst! Men can grin in falling; Come on, chaps, and be the first,-- Here’s your Mother calling!

_Arthur Maquarie._

ADAMS

CCXXV

THE DWELLINGS OF OUR DEAD

They lie unwatched, in waste and vacant places, In sombre bush or wind-swept tussock spaces, Where seldom human tread And never human trace is-- The dwellings of our dead!

No insolence of stone is o’er them builded; By mockery of monuments unshielded, Far on the unfenced plain Forgotten graves have yielded Earth to free earth again.

Above their crypts no air with incense reeling, No chant of choir or sob of organ pealing; But ever over them The evening breezes kneeling Whisper a requiem.

For some the margeless plain where no one passes, Save when at morning far in misty masses The drifting flock appears. Lo, here the greener grasses Glint like a stain of tears!

For some the common trench where, not all fameless, They fighting fell who thought to tame the tameless, And won their barren crown; Where one grave holds them nameless-- Brave white and braver brown.

But, in their sleep, like troubled children turning, A dream of mother-country in them burning, They whisper their despair, And one vague, voiceless yearning Burdens the pausing air....

‘_Unchanging here the drab year onward presses, No Spring comes trysting here with new-loosed tresses, And never may the years Win Autumn’s sweet caresses-- Her leaves that fall like tears._

_And we would lie ’neath old-remembered beeches, Where we could hear the voice of him who preaches And the deep organ’s call, While close about us reaches The cool, grey, lichened wall._’

But they are ours, and jealously we hold them; Within our children’s ranks we have enrolled them, And till all Time shall cease Our brooding bush shall fold them In her broad-bosomed peace.

They came as lovers come, all else forsaking, The bonds of home and kindred proudly breaking; They lie in splendour lone-- The nation of their making Their everlasting throne!

_Arthur Adams._

OGILVIE

CCXXVI

THE BUSH, MY LOVER

The camp-fire gleams resistance To every twinkling star; The horse-bells in the distance Are jangling faint and far; Through gum-boughs lorn and lonely The passing breezes sigh; In all the world are only My star-crowned Love and I.

The still night wraps Macquarie; The white moon, drifting slow, Takes back her silver glory From watching waves below; To dalliance I give over, Though half the world may chide, And clasp my one true Lover Here on Macquarie side.

The loves of earth grow olden Or kneel at some new shrine; Her locks are always golden-- This brave Bush-Love of mine; And for her star-lit beauty, And for her dawns dew-pearled, Her name in love and duty I guard against the world.