| |
| “WHY, Sergeant, stray on the Ivel Way, | |
| As though at home there were spectres rife? | |
| From first to last ’twas a proud career! | |
| And your sunny years with a gracious wife | |
| Have brought you a daughter dear. | 5 |
| |
| “I watched her to-day; a more comely maid, | |
| As she danced in her muslin bowed with blue, | |
| Round a Hintock maypole never gayed.” | |
| —“Aye, aye; I watched her this day, too, | |
| As it happens,” the Sergeant said. | 10 |
| |
| “My daughter is now,” he again began, | |
| “Of just such an age as one I knew | |
| When we of the Line, in the Foot-Guard van, | |
| On an August morning—a chosen few— | |
| Stormed San Sebastian. | 15 |
| |
| “She’s a score less three; so about was she— | |
| The maiden I wronged in Peninsular days…. | |
| You may prate of your prowess in lusty times, | |
| But as years gnaw inward you blink your bays, | |
| And see too well your crimes! | 20 |
| |
| “We’d stormed it at night, by the vlanker-light | |
| Of burning towers, and the mortar’s boom: | |
| We’d topped the breach but had failed to stay, | |
| For our files were misled by the baffling gloom; | |
| And we said we’d storm by day. | 25 |
| |
| “So, out of the trenches, with features set, | |
| On that hot, still morning, in measured pace, | |
| Our column climbed; climbed higher yet, | |
| Past the fauss’bray, scarp, up the curtain-face, | |
| And along the parapet. | 30 |
| |
| “From the batteried hornwork the cannoneers | |
| Hove crashing balls of iron fire; | |
| On the shaking gap mount the volunteers | |
| In files, and as they mount expire | |
| Amid curses, groans, and cheers. | 35 |
| |
| “Five hours did we storm, five hours re-form, | |
| As Death cooled those hot blood pricked on; | |
| Till our cause was helped by a woe within; | |
| They swayed from the summit we’d leapt upon, | |
| And madly we entered in. | 40 |
| |
| “On end for plunder, ’mid rain and thunder | |
| That burst with the lull of our cannonade, | |
| We vamped the streets in the stifling air— | |
| Our hunger unsoothed, our thirst unstayed— | |
| And ransacked the buildings there. | 45 |
| |
| “Down the stony steps of the house-fronts white | |
| We rolled rich puncheons of Spanish grape, | |
| Till at length, with the fire of the wine alight, | |
| I saw at a doorway a fair fresh shape— | |
| A woman, a sylph, or sprite. | 50 |
| |
| “Afeard she fled, and with heated head | |
| I pursued to the chamber she called her own; | |
| —When might is right no qualms deter, | |
| And having her helpless and alone | |
| I wreaked my lust on her. | 55 |
| |
| “She raised her beseeching eyes to me, | |
| And I heard the words of prayer she sent | |
| In her own soft language…. Seemingly | |
| I copied those eyes for my punishment | |
| In begetting the girl you see! | 60 |
| |
| “So, to-day I stand with a God-set brand | |
| Like Cain’s, when he wandered from kindred’s ken…. | |
| I served through the war that made Europe free; | |
| I wived me in peace-year. But, hid from men, | |
| I bear that mark on me. | 65 |
| |
| “And I nightly stray on the Ivel Way | |
| As though at home there were spectres rife; | |
| I delight me not in my proud career; | |
| And ’tis coals of fire that a gracious wife | |
| Should have brought me a daughter dear!” | 70 |
| |
