Kipling Stories and Poems Every Child Should Know, Book II

Dipping between the rollers, the English Flag goes by.

"The dead dumb fog hath wrapped it – the frozen dews have kissed —
The naked stars have seen it, a fellow-star in the mist.
What is the Flag of England? Ye have but my breath to dare,
Ye have but my waves to conquer. Go forth, for it is there!"

IV

THE KING

Farewell, Romance!" the Cave-men said;
"With bone well carved he went away;
Flint arms the ignoble arrowhead,
And jasper tips the spear to-day.
Changed are the Gods of Hunt and Dance,
And he with these. Farewell, Romance!"

"Farewell, Romance!" the Lake-folk sighed;
"We lift the weight of flatling years;
The caverns of the mountain side
Hold him who scorns our hutted piers.
Lost hills whereby we dare not dwell,
Guard ye his rest. Romance, farewell!"

"Farewell, Romance!" the Soldier spoke;
"By sleight of sword we may not win,
But scuffle 'mid uncleanly smoke
Of arquebus and culverin.
Honour is lost, and none may tell
Who paid good blows. Romance, farewell!"

"Farewell, Romance!" the Traders cried;
"Our keels ha' lain with every sea;
The dull-returning wind and tide
Heave up the wharf where we would be;
The known and noted breezes swell
Our trudging sail. Romance, farewell!"

"Good-bye, Romance!" the Skipper said;
"He vanished with the coal we burn;
Our dial marks full steam ahead.
Our speed is timed to half a turn.
Sure as the tidal trains we ply
'Twixt port and port. Romance, good-bye!"

"Romance!" the Season-tickets mourn,
"He never ran to catch his train,
But passed with coach and guard and horn —
And left the local – late again!
Confound Romance!" … And all unseen
Romance brought up the nine-fifteen.

His hand was on the lever laid,
His oil-can soothed the worrying cranks,
His whistle waked the snow-bound grade,
His fog-horn cut the reeking Banks;
In dock and deep and mine and mill
The Boy-god reckless laboured still.

Robed, crowned and throned, he wove his spell,
Where heart-blood beat or hearth-smoke curled
With unconsidered miracle,
Hedged in a backward-gazing world:
Then taught his chosen bard to say:
"The King was with us – yesterday!"

V

TO THE UNKNOWN GODDESS

Will you conquer my heart with your beauty, my soul going out from afar?
Shall I fall to your hand as a victim of crafty and cautious shikar?

Have I met you and passed you already, unknowing, unthinking, and blind
Shall I meet you next session at Simla, oh, sweetest and best of your kind?

Ah, Goddess! child, spinster, or widow – as of old on Mars Hill when they raised
To the God that they knew not an altar – so I, a young Pagan, have praised.

The Goddess I know not nor worship; yet if half that men tell me be true,
You will come in the future, and therefore these verses are written to you.

VI

THE GALLEY SLAVE

Oh, gallant was our galley from her carven steering-wheel
To her figurehead of silver and her beak of hammered steel;
The leg-bar chafed the ankle, and we gasped for cooler air,
But no galley on the water with our galley could compare!

Our bulkheads bulged with cotton and our masts were stepped in gold —
We ran a mighty merchandise of Negroes in the hold;
The white foam spun behind us, and the black shark swam below,
As we gripped the kicking sweep-head and we made that galley go.

It was merry in the galley, for we revelled now and then —
If they wore us down like cattle, faith, we fought and loved like men!
As we snatched her through the water, so we snatched a minute's bliss,