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1891
THERE were thirty million English who talked of England’s might, | |
| There were twenty broken troopers who lacked a bed for the night. | |
| They had neither food nor money, they had neither service nor trade; | |
| They were only shiftless soldiers, the last of the Light Brigade. | |
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| They felt that life was fleeting; they knew not that art was long, | 5 |
| That though they were dying of famine, they lived in deathless song. | |
| They asked for a little money to keep the wolf from the door; | |
| And the thirty million English sent twenty pounds and four! | |
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| They laid their heads together that were scarred and lined and gray; | |
| Keen were the Russian sabres, but want was keener than they; | 10 |
| And an old troop sergeant muttered, “Let us go to the man who writes | |
| The things on Balaclava the kiddies at school recites.” | |
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| They went without bands or colours, a regiment ten-file strong, | |
| To look for the Master-singer who had crowned them all in his song; | |
| And, waiting his servant’s order, by the garden gate they stayed, | 15 |
| A desolate little cluster, the last of the Light Brigade. | |
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| They strove to stand to attention, to straighten the toil-bowed back; | |
| They drilled on an empty stomach, the loose-knit files fell slack; | |
| With stooping of weary shoulders, in garments tattered and frayed, | |
| They shambled into his presence, the last of the Light Brigade. | 20 |
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| The old troop sergeant was spokesman, and “Beggin’ your pardon,” he said, | |
| “You wrote o’ the Light Brigade, sir. Here’s all that isn’t dead. | |
| An’ it’s all come true what you wrote, sir, regardin’ the mouth of hell; | |
| For we’re all of us nigh to the workhouse, an’ we thought we’d call an’ tell. | |
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| “No, thank you, we don’t want food, sir; but couldn’t you take an’ write | 25 |
| A sort of ‘to be continued’ and ‘see next page’ o’ the fight? | |
| We think that someone has blundered, an’ couldn’t you tell ’em how? | |
| You wrote we were heroes once, sir. Please, write we are starving now.” | |
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| The poor little army departed, limping and lean and forlorn. | |
| And the heart of the Master-singer grew hot with “the scorn of scorn.” | 30 |
| And he wrote for them wonderful verses that swept the land like flame, | |
| Till the fatted souls of the English were scourged with the thing called Shame. | |
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| O thirty million English that babble of England’s might, | |
| Behold there are twenty heroes who lack their food to-night; | |
| Our children’s children are lisping to “honour the charge they made—” | 35 |
| And we leave to the streets and the workhouse the charge of the Light Brigade! | |
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