THE FATE OF GENERAL GORDON.
NOT a drum was heard, not a martial note,
As our Gordon to Khartoum was hurried;
But into the desert our hero we shot,
And there in the desert he's buried.
No useful soldiers were with him sent,
Neither horseman nor footman we found him;
But alone, on a camel, our warrior went,
With the foe and the desert all round him.
Few and short were the prayers he made,
Not a word of complaint or of sorrow;
But we coldly declined to give him our aid,
And told him to wait—till "to-morrow!"
And he thought as he lay on his anxious bed,
Or the foe-threatened city defended:
"'Tis plain that the men who are over my head
Have ideas I've not quite comprehended."
And lightly men talk of his fanatic ways,
Because life and wealth he nought reckons;
But little he recks of their blame or their praise,
And goes straight where his own honour beckons.
Not half of his heavy task is done,
That of "rescuing and retiring"—
He will not retire, for he has rescued none,
And thousands upon him are firing.
Slowly and sadly I lay my pen down,
'Tis a mean and pitiful story;
God grant we mayn't have to carve on his stone,
"England left him alone in his glory."
GUINEA PIG.