I.

At anchor in that harbour of the island,
The Chinese gate,
We lay where, terraced under green-clad highland,
The sea-town sate.

Ships, steamers, sailors, many a flag and nation,
A motley crew,
Junks, sampans, all East’s swarming jubilation,
I watched and knew.

Then, as I stood, sweet sudden sounds out-swelling
On the boon breeze,
The church-bells’ chiming echoes rang out, telling
Of inland peace.

O English chimes, your music rising and falling
I cannot praise,
Although to me it come sweet-sad recalling
Dear childish days.

Yet, English chimes,—last links of chains that sever,
Worn out and done,
That land and creed that I have left for ever,—
Ring on, ring on!

II.

There is much in this sea-way city
I have not met with before,
But one or two things I notice
That I seem to have known of yore.

In the lovely tropical verdure,
In the streets, behold I can
The hideous English buildings
And the brutal English man!

III.

I stand and watch the soldiers
Marching up and down,
Above the fresh green cricket-ground
Just outside the town.

I stand and watch and wonder
When in the English land
This poor fool Tommy Atkins
Will learn and understand?

Zulus, and Boers, and Arabs,
All fighting to be free,
Men and women and children,
Murdered and maimed has he.

In India and in Ireland
He’s held the People down,
While the robber English gentleman
Took pound and penny and crown.

To make him false to his order,
What was it that they gave—
To make him his brother’s oppressor?
The clothes and pay of a slave!

O thou poor fool, Tommy Atkins,
Thou wilt be wise that day
When, with eager eyes and clenched teeth,
Thou risest up to say:

“This is our well-loved England,
And I’ll free it, if I can,
From every rotten bourgeois
And played-out gentleman!”

IV.
“happy valley.” [66]

There is a valley green that lies
’Mid hills, the summer’s bower.
The many coloured butterflies
Flutter from flower to flower.

And round one lush green side of it,
In gardened homes are laid,
With grief and care compassionate,
The people of the dead.

There all the voicing summer day
They sing, the happy rills.
No noisy sound awakes away
The echo of the hills.

A GLIMPSE OF CHINA.

I.
in a sampan.
(Min River, Fo Kien.)

Up in the misty morning,
Up past the gardened hills,
With the rhythmic stroke of the rowers,
While the blue deep pales and thrills!

Past the rice-fields green low-lying,
Where the sea-gull’s winging down
From the fleets of junks and sampans
And the ancient Chinese Town!

II.
in a chair.
(Foo-chow.)

From the bright and blinding sunshine,
From the whirling locust’s song,
Into the dark and narrow fissures
Of the streets I am borne along.

Here and there dusky-beaming
A sun-shaft broadens and drops
On the brown bare crowd slow-passing
The crowd of the open shops.

We move on over the bridges
With their straight-hewn blocks of stone.
And their quaint grey animal figures,
And the booths the hucksters own.

Behind a linen awning
Sits an ancient wight half-dead,
And a little dear of a girl is
Examining—his head.

On a bended bamboo shouldered,
Bearing a block of stone,
Two worn-out coolies half-naked
Utter their grunting groan.

Children, almond-eyed beauties,
Impossibly mangy curs,
Take part in the motley stream of
Insouciant passengers.

This is the dream, the vision
That comes to me and greets—
The vision of Retribution
In the labyrinthine streets!

III.
“caste.”

These Chinese toil and yet they do not starve,
And they obey, and yet they are not slaves.
It is the “free-born” fuddled Englishmen
That grovel rotting in their living graves.

These Chinese do not fawn with servile lips;
They lift up equal eyes that ask and scan.
Their degradation has escaped at least
That choicest curse of all—the gentleman!

IV.
over the samovar. [69a]
(Foo-chow.)

“Yes, I used always to think
That you Russians knew
How to make the good drink
As none others do.

“And I thought moreover,
(Not with the epicures),
You might search the world over
For such women as yours.

“In both these matters now
I perceive I was right,
And I really can’t tell you how
Much I delight

“In my third (Thanks, another cup!)
Idea of the fun,
When your country gets up
And follows the sun!

“And just as in Europe, see,
There’s a conqueror nation,
So why not in Asia be
A like jubilation?

“Taught as well as organized, [69b]
The eternal Coolie,
From being robbed and despised,
Takes to cutting throats duly!

“But—please, don’t be flurried;
For I daresay by then
You’ll be comfortably buried,
Ladies and gentlemen!

“No more, thanks! I must be going!
I’m so glad to have made this
Opportunity of knowing
Some more Russian ladies!”