CERTAIN MAXIMS OF HAFIZ
I.
If It be pleasant to look on, stalled in the packed serai,
Does not the Young Man try Its temper and pace ere he buy?
If She be pleasant to look on, what does the Young Man say?
“Lo! She is pleasant to look on, give Her to me today!”
II.
Yea, though a Kafir die, to him is remitted Jehannum
If he borrowed in life from a native at sixty per cent. per annum.
III.
Blister we not for bursati? So when the heart is vexed,
The pain of one maiden's refusal is drowned in the pain of the next.
IV.
The temper of chums, the love of your wife, and a new piano's tune—
Which of the three will you trust at the end of an Indian June?
V.
Who are the rulers of Ind—to whom shall we bow the knee?
Make your peace with the women, and men will make you L. G.
VI.
Does the woodpecker flit round the young ferash?
Does grass clothe a new-built wall?
Is she under thirty, the woman who holds a boy in her thrall?
VII.
If She grow suddenly gracious—reflect. Is it all for thee?
The black-buck is stalked through the bullock, and Man through jealousy.
VIII.
Seek not for favor of women. So shall you find it indeed.
Does not the boar break cover just when you're lighting a weed?
IX.
If He play, being young and unskilful, for shekels of silver and gold,
Take his money, my son, praising Allah. The kid was ordained to be sold.
X.
With a “weed” among men or horses verily this is the best,
That you work him in office or dog-cart lightly—but give him no rest.
XI.
Pleasant the snaffle of Courtship, improving the manners and carriage;
But the colt who is wise will abstain from the terrible thorn-bit of Marriage.
XII.
As the thriftless gold of the babul, so is the gold that we spend
On a derby Sweep, or our neighbor's wife, or the horse that we buy from a
friend.
XIII.
The ways of man with a maid be strange, yet simple and tame
To the ways of a man with a horse, when selling or racing that same.
XIV.
In public Her face turneth to thee, and pleasant Her smile when ye meet.
It is ill. The cold rocks of El-Gidar smile thus on the waves at their feet.
In public Her face is averted, with anger. She nameth thy name.
It is well. Was there ever a loser content with the loss of the game?
XV.
If She have spoken a word, remember thy lips are sealed,
And the Brand of the Dog is upon him by whom is the secret revealed.
If She have written a letter, delay not an instant, but burn it.
Tear it to pieces, O Fool, and the wind to her mate shall return it!
If there be trouble to Herward, and a lie of the blackest can clear,
Lie, while thy lips can move or a man is alive to hear.
XVI.
My Son, if a maiden deny thee and scufflingly bid thee give o'er,
Yet lip meets with lip at the last word—get out!
She has been there before.
They are pecked on the ear and the chin and the nose who are lacking in lore.
XVII.
If we fall in the race, though we win, the hoof-slide is scarred on the
course.
Though Allah and Earth pardon Sin, remaineth forever Remorse.
XVIII.
“By all I am misunderstood!” if the Matron shall say, or the Maid:
“Alas! I do not understand,” my son, be thou nowise afraid.
In vain in the sight of the Bird is the net of the Fowler displayed.
XIX.
My son, if I, Hafiz, the father, take hold of thy knees in my pain,
Demanding thy name on stamped paper, one day or one hour—refrain.
Are the links of thy fetters so light that thou cravest another man's chain?
THE GRAVE OF THE HUNDRED HEAD
There's a widow in sleepy Chester
Who weeps for her only son;
There's a grave on the Pabeng River,
A grave that the Burmans shun,
And there's Subadar Prag Tewarri
Who tells how the work was done.
A Snider squibbed in the jungle,
Somebody laughed and fled,
And the men of the First Shikaris
Picked up their Subaltern dead,
With a big blue mark in his forehead
And the back blown out of his head.
Subadar Prag Tewarri,
Jemadar Hira Lal,
Took command of the party,
Twenty rifles in all,
Marched them down to the river
As the day was beginning to fall.
They buried the boy by the river,
A blanket over his face—
They wept for their dead Lieutenant,
The men of an alien race—
They made a samadh in his honor,
A mark for his resting-place.
For they swore by the Holy Water,
They swore by the salt they ate,
That the soul of Lieutenant Eshmitt Sahib
Should go to his God in state;
With fifty file of Burman
To open him Heaven's gate.
The men of the First Shikaris
Marched till the break of day,
Till they came to the rebel village,
The village of Pabengmay—
A jingal covered the clearing,
Calthrops hampered the way.
Subadar Prag Tewarri,
Bidding them load with ball,
Halted a dozen rifles
Under the village wall;
Sent out a flanking-party
With Jemadar Hira Lal.
The men of the First Shikaris
Shouted and smote and slew,
Turning the grinning jingal
On to the howling crew.
The Jemadar's flanking-party
Butchered the folk who flew.
Long was the morn of slaughter,
Long was the list of slain,
Five score heads were taken,
Five score heads and twain;
And the men of the First Shikaris
Went back to their grave again,
Each man bearing a basket
Red as his palms that day,
Red as the blazing village—
The village of Pabengmay,
And the “drip-drip-drip” from the baskets
Reddened the grass by the way.
They made a pile of their trophies
High as a tall man's chin,
Head upon head distorted,
Set in a sightless grin,
Anger and pain and terror
Stamped on the smoke-scorched skin.
Subadar Prag Tewarri
Put the head of the Boh
On the top of the mound of triumph,
The head of his son below,
With the sword and the peacock-banner
That the world might behold and know.
Thus the samadh was perfect,
Thus was the lesson plain
Of the wrath of the First Shikaris—
The price of a white man slain;
And the men of the First Shikaris
Went back into camp again.
Then a silence came to the river,
A hush fell over the shore,
And Bohs that were brave departed,
And Sniders squibbed no more;
For the Burmans said
That a kullah's head
Must be paid for with heads five score.
There's a widow in sleepy Chester
Who weeps for her only son;
There's a grave on the Pabeng River,
A grave that the Burmans shun,
And there's Subadar Prag Tewarri
Who tells how the work was done.
THE MOON OF OTHER DAYS
Beneath the deep veranda's shade,
When bats begin to fly,
I sit me down and watch—alas!—
Another evening die.
Blood-red behind the sere ferash
She rises through the haze.
Sainted Diana! can that be
The Moon of Other Days?
Ah! shade of little Kitty Smith,
Sweet Saint of Kensington!
Say, was it ever thus at Home
The Moon of August shone,
When arm in arm we wandered long
Through Putney's evening haze,
And Hammersmith was Heaven beneath
The Moon of Other Days?
But Wandle's stream is Sutlej now,
And Putney's evening haze
The dust that half a hundred kine
Before my window raise.
Unkempt, unclean, athwart the mist
The seething city looms,
In place of Putney's golden gorse
The sickly babul blooms.
Glare down, old Hecate, through the dust,
And bid the pie-dog yell,
Draw from the drain its typhoid-germ,
From each bazaar its smell;
Yea, suck the fever from the tank
And sap my strength therewith:
Thank Heaven, you show a smiling face
To little Kitty Smith!
THE OVERLAND MAIL
(Foot-Service to the Hills)
In the name of the Empress of India, make way,
O Lords of the Jungle, wherever you roam.
The woods are astir at the close of the day—
We exiles are waiting for letters from Home.
Let the robber retreat—let the tiger turn tail—
In the Name of the Empress, the Overland Mail!
With a jingle of bells as the dusk gathers in,
He turns to the foot-path that heads up the hill—
The bags on his back and a cloth round his chin,
And, tucked in his waist-belt, the Post Office bill:
“Despatched on this date, as received by the rail,
Per runner, two bags of the Overland Mail.”
Is the torrent in spate? He must ford it or swim.
Has the rain wrecked the road? He must climb by the cliff.
Does the tempest cry “Halt”? What are tempests to him?
The Service admits not a “but” or and “if.”
While the breath's in his mouth, he must bear without fail,
In the Name of the Empress, the Overland Mail.
From aloe to rose-oak, from rose-oak to fir,
From level to upland, from upland to crest,
From rice-field to rock-ridge, from rock-ridge to spur,
Fly the soft sandalled feet, strains the brawny brown chest.
From rail to ravine—to the peak from the vale—
Up, up through the night goes the Overland Mail.
There's a speck on the hillside, a dot on the road—
A jingle of bells on the foot-path below—
There's a scuffle above in the monkey's abode—
The world is awake, and the clouds are aglow.
For the great Sun himself must attend to the hail:
“In the name of the Empress the Overland Mail!”