THE HUMILIATION OF THE PALFREY.
Where is she now, the pride of the battalion,
That ambled always at the Colonel's side,
A fair white steed, like some majestic galleon
Which takes deliberate the harbour tide,
So soft, so slow, she scarcely seems to stir?
And that, indeed, was very true of her
Who was till late, so kind her character,
The only horse the Adjutant could ride.
Ever she led the regiment on its journeys,
And held sweet converse with the Colonel's gee:
Of knights, no doubt, and old heroic tourneys,
And how she bare great ladies o'er the lea;
And on high hill-sides, when the men felt dead,
Far up the height they viewed her at the head,
A star of hope, and shook themselves, and said,
"If she can do it, dammit, so can we!"
But where is now my Adjutantial palfrey?
In front no longer but in rear to-day,
Behind the bicycles, and not at all free
To be familiar with the General's gray,
She walks in shame with all those misanthropes,
The sad pack-animals who have no hopes
But must by men be led about on ropes,
Condemned till death to carry S.A.A.,
And bombs, and beef, and officers' valises;
And I at eve have marked my wistful mare
By thronging dumps where cursing never ceases
And rations come, for oft she brings them there,
Patient, aloof; and when the shrapnel dropp'd
And the young mules complained and kicked and hopp'd,
She only stood unmoved, with one leg propp'd,
As if she heard it not or did not care;
Or heard, maybe, but hoped to get a Blighty;
For on her past she lately seemed to brood
And dreamed herself once more among the mighty,
By grooms beloved and reverently shoed;
But now she has no standing in the corps,
And Death itself would hardly be a bore,
Save that, although she carries me no more,
'Tis something still to carry up my food.
A.P.H.