Songs of Action | Page 6

from the
beaten track
And now were wearily harking back,
Ever staring
round for the signal jack
That marked their comrades camping.
The one was Corporal Robert Dick,
Bearded and burly, short and
thick,
Rough of speech and in temper quick,
A hard-faced old rapscallion.
The other, fresh from the barrack square,

Was a raw recruit, smooth-cheeked and fair
Half grown, half
drilled, with the weedy air
Of a draft from the home battalion.
Weary and parched and hunger-torn,
They had wandered on from

early morn,
And the young boy-soldier limped forlorn,
Now stumbling and now falling.
Around the orange sand-curves lay,

Flecked with boulders, black or grey,
Death-silent, save that far
away
A kite was shrilly calling.
A kite? Was THAT a kite? The yell
That shrilly rose and faintly fell?

No kite's, and yet the kite knows well
The long-drawn wild halloo.
And right athwart the evening sky
The
yellow sand-spray spurtled high,
And shrill and shriller swelled the
cry
Of 'Allah! Allahu!'
The Corporal peered at the crimson West,
Hid his pipe in his khaki
vest.
Growled out an oath and onward pressed,
Still glancing over his shoulder.
'Bedouins, mate!' he curtly said;

'We'll find some work for steel and lead,
And maybe sleep in a sandy
bed,
Before we're one hour older.
'But just one flutter before we're done.
Stiffen your lip and stand, my
son;
We'll take this bloomin' circus on:
Ball-cartridge load! Now, steady!'
With a curse and a prayer the two
faced round,
Dogged and grim they stood their ground,
And their
breech-blocks snapped with a crisp clean sound
As the rifles sprang to the 'ready.'
Alas for the Emir Ali Khan!
A hundred paces before his clan,
That
ebony steed of the prophet's breed

Is the foal of death and of danger.
A spurt of fire, a gasp of pain,
A
blueish blurr on the yellow plain,
The chief was down, and his bridle
rein
Was in the grip of the stranger.
With the light of hope on his rugged face,
The Corporal sprang to the
dead man's place,
One prick with the steel, one thrust with the heel,
And where was the man to outride him?
A grip of his knees, a toss of
his rein,
He was settling her down to her gallop again,
When he
stopped, for he heard just one faltering word
From the young recruit beside him.
One faltering word from pal to pal,
But it found the heart of the
Corporal.
He had sprung to the sand, he had lent him a hand,
'Up, mate! They'll be 'ere in a minute;
Off with you! No palaver! Go!

I'll bide be'ind and run this show.
Promotion has been cursed slow,
And this is my chance to win it.'
Into the saddle he thrust him quick,
Spurred the black mare with a
bayonet prick.
Watched her gallop with plunge and with kick
Away o'er the desert careering.
Then he turned with a softened face,

And loosened the strap of his cartridge-case,
While his thoughts
flew back to the dear old place
In the sunny Hampshire clearing.
The young boy-private, glancing back,
Saw the Bedouins' wild attack,

And heard the sharp Martini crack.
But as he gazed, already
The fierce fanatic Arab band
Was closing

in on every hand,
Until one tawny swirl of sand,
Concealed them in its eddy.
0. * *
A squadron of British horse that night,
Galloping hard in the shadowy
light,
Came on the scene of that last stern fight,
And found the Corporal lying
Silent and grim on the trampled sand,

His rifle grasped in his stiffened hand,
With the warrior pride of
one who died
'Mid a ring of the dead and the dying.
And still when twilight shadows fall,
After the evening bugle call,

In bivouac or in barrack-hall,
His comrades speak of the Corporal,
His death and his devotion.
And there are some who like to say

That perhaps a hidden meaning lay
In the words he spoke, and that
the day
When his rough bold spirit passed away
WAS the day that he won promotion.
A FORGOTTEN TALE
[The scene of this ancient fight, recorded by Froissart, is still called
'Altura de los Inglesos.' Five hundred years later
Wellington's soldiers
were fighting on the same ground.]
'Say, what saw you on the hill,
Campesino Garcia?'
'I saw my brindled heifer there,
A trail of
bowmen, spent and bare,
And a little man on a sorrel mare
Riding slow before them.'
'Say, what saw you in the vale,

Campesino Garcia?'
'There I saw my lambing ewe
And an army
riding through,
Thick and brave the pennons flew
From the lances o'er them.'
'Then what saw you on the hill,
Campesino Garcia?'
'I saw beside the milking byre,
White with
want and black with mire,
The little man with eyes afire
Marshalling his bowmen.'
'Then what saw you in the vale,
Campesino Garcia?'
'There I saw my bullocks twain,
And amid my
uncut grain
All the hardy men of Spain
Spurring for their foemen.'
'Nay, but there is more to tell,
Campesino Garcia!'
'I could not bide the end to view;
I had graver
things to do
Tending on the lambing ewe
Down among the clover.'
'Ah, but tell me what you heard,
Campesino Garcia!'
'Shouting