Poems. Volume 1. George Meredith

      Poems – Volume 1

      CHILLIANWALLAH 1

      Chillanwallah, Chillanwallah!

         Where our brothers fought and bled,

      O thy name is natural music

         And a dirge above the dead!

      Though we have not been defeated,

         Though we can’t be overcome,

      Still, whene’er thou art repeated,

         I would fain that grief were dumb.

      Chillianwallah, Chillianwallah!

         ’Tis a name so sad and strange,

      Like a breeze through midnight harpstrings

         Ringing many a mournful change;

      But the wildness and the sorrow

         Have a meaning of their own—

      Oh, whereof no glad to-morrow

         Can relieve the dismal tone!

      Chillianwallah, Chillianwallah!

         ’Tis a village dark and low,

      By the bloody Jhelum river

         Bridged by the foreboding foe;

      And across the wintry water

         He is ready to retreat,

      When the carnage and the slaughter

         Shall have paid for his defeat.

      Chillianwallah, Chillianwallah!

         ’Tis a wild and dreary plain,

      Strewn with plots of thickest jungle,

         Matted with the gory stain.

      There the murder-mouthed artillery,

         In the deadly ambuscade,

      Wrought the thunder of its treachery

         On the skeleton brigade.

      Chillianwallah, Chillianwallah!

         When the night set in with rain,

      Came the savage plundering devils

         To their work among the slain;

      And the wounded and the dying

         In cold blood did share the doom

      Of their comrades round them lying,

         Stiff in the dead skyless gloom.

      Chillianwallah, Chillianwallah!

         Thou wilt be a doleful chord,

      And a mystic note of mourning

         That will need no chiming word;

      And that heart will leap with anguish

         Who may understand thee best;

      But the hopes of all will languish

         Till thy memory is at rest.

      THE DOE: A FRAGMENT

      (FROM‘WANDERING WILLIE’)

      And—‘Yonder look! yoho! yoho!

      Nancy is off!’ the farmer cried,

      Advancing by the river side,

      Red-kerchieft and brown-coated;—‘So,

      My girl, who else could leap like that?

      So neatly! like a lady!  ‘Zounds!

      Look at her how she leads the hounds!’

      And waving his dusty beaver hat,

      He cheered across the chase-filled water,

      And clapt his arm about his daughter,

      And gave to Joan a courteous hug,

      And kiss that, like a stubborn plug

      From generous vats in vastness rounded,

      The inner wealth and spirit sounded:

      Eagerly pointing South, where, lo,

      The daintiest, fleetest-footed doe

      Led o’er the fields and thro’ the furze

      Beyond: her lively delicate ears

      Prickt up erect, and in her track

      A dappled lengthy-striding pack.

      Scarce had they cast eyes upon her,

      When every heart was wagered on her,

      And half in dread, and half delight,

      They watched her lovely bounding flight;

      As now across the flashing green,

      And now beneath the stately trees,

      And now far distant in the dene,

      She headed on with graceful ease:

      Hanging aloft with doubled knees,

      At times athwart some hedge or gate;

      And slackening pace by slow degrees,

      As for the foremost foe to wait.

      Renewing her outstripping rate

      Whene’er the hot pursuers neared,

      By garden wall and paled estate,

      Where clambering gazers whooped and cheered.

      Here winding under elm and oak,

      And slanting up the sunny hill:

      Splashing the water here like smoke

      Among the mill-holms round the mill.

      And—‘Let her go; she shows her game,

      My Nancy girl, my pet and treasure!’

      The farmer sighed: his eyes with pleasure

      Brimming: ‘’Tis my daughter’s name,

      My second daughter lying yonder.’

      And Willie’s eye in search did wander,

      And caught at once, with moist regard,

      The white gleams of a grey churchyard.

      ‘Three weeks before my girl had gone,

      And while upon her pillows propped,

      She lay at eve; the weakling fawn—

      For still it seems a fawn just dropt

      A se’nnight—to my Nancy’s bed

      I brought to make my girl a gift:

      The mothers of them both were dead:

      And both to bless it was my drift,

      By giving each a friend; not thinking

      How rapidly my girl was sinking.

      And I remember how, to pat

      Its neck, she stretched her hand so weak,

      And its cold nose against her cheek

      Pressed fondly: and I fetched the mat

      To make it up a couch just by her,

      Where in the lone dark hours to lie:

      For neither dear old nurse nor I

      Would any single wish deny her.

      And there unto the last it lay;

      And in the pastures cared to play

      Little or nothing: there its meals

      And milk I brought: and even now

      The creature such affection feels

      For that old room that, when and how,

      ’Tis strange to mark, it slinks and steals

      To get

1

First contributed to a MS. magazine, ‘The Monthly Observer,’ in the year 1849; first printed in Chambers’ Edinburgh Journal, July 7, 1849.