| |
| AS I left the Halls at Lumley, rose the vision of a comely | |
| Maid last season worshipped dumbly, watched with fervour from afar; | |
| And I wondered idly, blindly, if the maid would greet me kindly. | |
| That was all—the rest was settled by the clinking tonga-bar. 1 | |
| Yea, my life and hers were coupled by the tonga coupling-bar. | 5 |
| |
| For my misty meditation, at the second changing-station, | |
| Suffered sudden dislocation, fled before the tuneless jar | |
| Of a Wagner obbligato, scherzo, double-hand staccato, | |
| Played on either pony’s saddle by the clacking tonga-bar— | |
| Played with human speech, I fancied, by the jigging, jolting bar. | 10 |
| |
| “She was sweet,” thought I, “last season, but ’twere surely wild unreason | |
| “Such a tiny hope to freeze on as was offered by my Star, | |
| “When she whispered, something sadly: ‘I—we feel your going badly!’” | |
| “And you let the chance escape you?” rapped the rattling tonga-bar. | |
| “What a chance and what an idiot!” clicked the vicious tonga-bar. | 15 |
| |
| Heart of man—O heart of putty! Had I gone by Kakahutti, | |
| On the old Hill-road and rutty, I had ’scaped that fatal car. | |
| But his fortune each must bide by, so I watched the milestones slide by | |
| To—“You call on Her to-morrow!” fugue with cymbals by the bar— | |
| “You must call on Her to-morrow!”—post-horn gallop by the bar. | 20 |
| |
| Yet a further stage my goal on—we were whirling down to Solon, | |
| With a double lurch and roll on, best foot foremost, ganz und gar— | |
| “She was very sweet,” I hinted. “If a kiss had been imprinted———?” | |
| “’Would ha’ saved a world of trouble!” clashed the busy tonga-bar. | |
| “’Been accepted or rejected!” banged and clanged the tonga-bar. | 25 |
| |
| Then a notion wild and daring, ’spite the income-tax’s paring | |
| And a hasty thought of sharing—less than many incomes are— | |
| Made me put a question private, (you can guess what I would drive at.) | |
| “You must work the sum to prove it,” clanked the careless tonga-bar. | |
| “Simple Rule of Two will prove it,” lilted back the tonga-bar. | 30 |
| |
| It was under Khyraghaut I mused:—“Suppose the maid be haughty— | |
| “There are lovers rich—and forty; wait some wealthy Avatar? | |
| “Answer, monitor untiring, ’twixt the ponies twain perspiring!” | |
| “Faint heart never won fair lady,” creaked the straining tonga-bar. | |
| “Can I tell you ere you ask Her?” pounded slow the tonga-bar. | 35 |
| |
| Last, the Tara Devi turning showed the lights of Simla burning, | |
| Lit my little lazy yearning to a fiercer flame by far. | |
| As below the Mall we jingled, through my very heart it tingled— | |
| Did the iterated order of the threshing tonga-bar:— | |
| “Try your luck—you can’t do better!” twanged the loosened tonga-bar. | 40 |
