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Queen Victoria’s Jubilee
JUNE 21ST 1887
BY the well, where the bullocks go | |
| Silent and blind and slow— | |
| By the field, where the young corn dies | |
| In the face of the sultry skies, | |
| They have heard, as the dull Earth hears | 5 |
| The voice of the wind of an hour, | |
| The sound of the Great Queen’s voice:— | |
| “My God hath given me years, | |
| “Hath granted dominion and power: | |
| “And I bid you, O Land, rejoice.” | 10 |
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| And the Ploughman settles the share | |
| More deep in the grudging clod; | |
| For he saith:—“The wheat is my care, | |
| “And the rest is the will of God. | |
| “He sent the Mahratta spear | 15 |
| “As He sendeth the rain, | |
| “And the Mlech, 1 in the fated year, | |
| “Broke the spear in twain, | |
| “And was broken in turn. Who knows | |
| “How our Lords make strife? | 20 |
| “It is good that the young wheat grows, | |
| “For the bread is Life.” | |
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| Then, far and near, as the twilight drew, | |
| Hissed up to the scornful dark | |
| Great serpents, blazing, of red and blue, | 25 |
| That rose and faded, and rose anew, | |
| That the Land might wonder and mark. | |
| “To-day is a day of days,” they said, | |
| “Make merry, O People, all!” | |
| And the Ploughman listened and bowed his head:— | 30 |
| “To-day and to-morrow God’s will,” he said, | |
| As he trimmed the lamps on the wall. | |
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| “He sendeth us years that are good, | |
| “As He sendeth the dearth. | |
| “He giveth to each man his food, | 35 |
| “Or Her food to the Earth. | |
| “Our Kings and our Queens are afar— | |
| “On their peoples be peace— | |
| “God bringeth the rain to the Bar, | |
| “That our cattle increase.” | 40 |
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| And the Ploughman settled the share | |
| More deep in the sun-dried clod:— | |
| “Mogul, Mahratta, and Mlech from the North, | |
| “And White Queen over the Seas— | |
| “God raiseth them up and driveth them forth | 45 |
| “As the dust of the ploughshare flies in the breeze; | |
| “But the wheat and the cattle are all my care, | |
| “And the rest is the will of God.” | |
