Chapter VII: Act I: SCENE I.--A House near Whitehall (3)

_Pym._ Have I done well? Speak, England! Whose sole sake
I still have labored for, with disregard
To my own heart,--for whom my youth was made
Barren, my manhood waste, to offer up
Her sacrifice--this friend, this Wentworth here--
Who walked in youth with me, loved me, it may be,
And whom, for his forsaking England's cause,
I hunted by all means (trusting that she
Would sanctify all means) even to the block
Which waits for him. And saying this, I feel
No bitterer pang than first I felt, the hour
I swore that Wentworth might leave us, but I
Would never leave him: I do leave him now.
I render up my charge (be witness, God!)
To England who imposed it. I have done
Her bidding--poorly, wrongly,--it may be,
With ill effects--for I am weak, a man:
Still, I have done my best, my human best,
Not faltering for a moment. It is done.
And this said, if I say ... yes, I will say
I never loved but one man--David not
More Jonathan! Even thus, I love him now:
And look for my chief portion in that world
Where great hearts led astray are turned again,
(Soon it may be, and, certes, will be soon:
My mission over, I shall not live long,)--
Ay, here I know I talk--I dare and must,
Of England, and her great reward, as all
I look for there; but in my inmost heart,
Believe, I think of stealing quite away
To walk once more with Wentworth--my youth's friend
Purged from all error, gloriously renewed,
And Eliot shall not blame us. Then indeed....
This is no meeting, Wentworth! Tears increase
Too hot. A thin mist--is it blood?--enwraps
The face I loved once. Then, the meeting be!

_Strafford._ I have loved England too; we'll meet then, Pym.
As well die now! Youth is the only time
To think and to decide on a great course:
Manhood with action follows; but 'tis dreary,
To have to alter our whole life in age--
The time past, the strength gone! As well die now.
When we meet, Pym, I'd be set right--not now!
Best die. Then if there's any fault, fault too
Dies, smothered up. Poor grey old little Laud
May dream his dream out, of a perfect Church,
In some blind corner. And there's no one left.
I trust the King now wholly to you, Pym!
And yet, I know not: I shall not be there:
Friends fail--if he have any. And he's weak,
And loves the Queen, and.... Oh, my fate is nothing--
Nothing! But not that awful head--not that!

_Pym._ If England shall declare such will to me....

_Strafford._ Pym, you help England! I, that am to die,
What I must see! 'tis here--all here! My God,
Let me but gasp out, in one word of fire,
How thou wilt plague him, satiating hell!
What? England that you help, become through you
A green and putrefying charnel, left
Our children ... some of us have children, Pym--
Some who, without that, still must ever wear
A darkened brow, an over-serious look,
And never properly be young! No word?
What if I curse you? Send a strong curse forth
Clothed from my heart, lapped round with horror till
She's fit with her white face to walk the world
Scaring kind natures from your cause and you--
Then to sit down with you at the board-head,
The gathering for prayer.... O speak, but speak!
... Creep up, and quietly follow each one home,
You, you, you, be a nestling care for each
To sleep with,--hardly moaning in his dreams.
She gnaws so quietly,--till, lo he starts,
Gets off with half a heart eaten away!
Oh, shall you 'scape with less if she's my child?
You will not say a word--to me--to Him?

_Pym._ If England shall declare such will to me....

_Strafford._ No, not for England now, not for Heaven now,--
See, Pym, for my sake, mine who kneel to you!
There, I will thank you for the death, my friend!
This is the meeting: let me love you well!

_Pym._ England,--I am thine own! Dost thou exact
That service? I obey thee to the end.

_Strafford._ O God, I shall die first--I shall die first!

* * * * *

A lively picture of Cavalier sentiment is given in the "Cavalier Tunes"--which ought to furnish conclusive proof that Browning does not always put himself into his work. They may be compared with the words set to Avison's march given in the last chapter which presents just as sympathetically "Roundhead" sentiment.

I. MARCHING ALONG

I

Kentish Sir Byng stood for his King,
Bidding the crop-headed Parliament swing:
And, pressing a troop unable to stoop
And see the rogues flourish and honest folk droop,
Marched them along, fifty-score strong,
Great-hearted gentlemen, singing this song.

II

God for King Charles! Pym and such carles
To the Devil that prompts 'em their treasonous parles!
Cavaliers, up! Lips from the cup,
Hands from the pasty, nor bite take nor sup
Till you're--

CHORUS.--_Marching along, fifty-score strong,
Great-hearted gentlemen, singing this song._

III

Hampden to hell, and his obsequies' knell
Serve Hazelrig, Fiennes, and young Harry as well!
England, good cheer! Rupert is near!
Kentish and loyalists, keep we not here

CHORUS.--_Marching along, fifty-score strong,
Great-hearted gentlemen, singing this song?_

IV

Then, God for King Charles! Pym and his snarls
To the Devil that pricks on such pestilent carles!
Hold by the right, you double your might;
So, onward to Nottingham, fresh for the fight,

CHORUS.--_March we along, fifty-score strong,
Great-hearted gentlemen, singing this song!_

II. GIVE A ROUSE

I

King Charles, and who'll do him right now?
King Charles, and who's ripe for fight now?
Give a rouse: here's, in hell's despite now,
King Charles!

II

Who gave me the goods that went since?
Who raised me the house that sank once?
Who helped me to gold I spent since?
Who found me in wine you drank once?

CHORUS.--_King Charles, and who'll do him right now?
King Charles, and who's ripe for fight now?
Give a rouse: here's, in hell's despite now,
King Charles!_

III

To whom used my boy George quaff else,
By the old fool's side that begot him?
For whom did he cheer and laugh else,
While Noll's damned troopers shot him?

CHORUS.--_King Charles, and who'll do him right now?
King Charles, and who's ripe for fight now?
Give a rouse: here's, in hell's despite now,
King Charles!_

III. BOOT AND SADDLE

I

Boot, saddle, to horse, and away!
Rescue my castle before the hot day
Brightens to blue from its silvery grey,

CHORUS.--"_Boot, saddle, to horse, and away!_"

II

Ride past the suburbs, asleep as you'd say;
Many's the friend there, will listen and pray
"God's luck to gallants that strike up the lay--"

CHORUS.--"_Boot, saddle, to horse, and away!_"

III

Forty miles off, like a roebuck at bay,
Flouts Castle Brancepeth the Roundheads' array:
Who laughs, "Good fellows ere this, by my fay,"

CHORUS.--"_Boot, saddle, to horse, and away!_"

IV

Who? My wife Gertrude; that, honest and gay,
Laughs when you talk of surrendering, "Nay!
I've better counsellors; what counsel they?"

CHORUS.--"_Boot, saddle, to horse, and away!_"

Though not illustrative of the subject in hand, "Martin Relph" is included here on account of the glimpse it gives of an episode, interesting in English History, though devoid of serious consequences, since it marked the final abortive struggle of a dying cause.

An imaginary incident of the rebellion in the time of George II., forms the background of "Martin Relph," the point of the story being the life-long agony of reproach suffered by Martin who let his envy and jealousy conquer him at a crucial moment. The history of the attempt of Charles Edward to get back the crown of England, supported by a few thousand Highlanders, of his final defeat at the Battle of Culloden, and of the decay henceforth of Jacobitism, needs no telling. The treatment of spies as herein shown is a common-place of war-times, but that a reprieve exonerating the accused should be prevented from reaching its destination in time through the jealousy of the only person who saw it coming gives the episode a tragic touch lifting it into an atmosphere of peculiar individual pathos.

MARTIN RELPH

_My grandfather says he remembers he saw, when a youngster long ago,
On a bright May day, a strange old man, with a beard as white as snow,
Stand on the hill outside our town like a monument of woe,
And, striking his bare bald head the while, sob out the reason--so!_

If I last as long at Methuselah I shall never forgive myself:
But--God forgive me, that I pray, unhappy Martin Relph,
As coward, coward I call him--him, yes, him! Away from me!
Get you behind the man I am now, you man that I used to be!

What can have sewed my mouth up, set me a-stare, all eyes, no tongue?
People have urged "You visit a scare too hard on a lad so young!
You were taken aback, poor boy," they urge, "no time to regain
your wits:
Besides it had maybe cost you life." Ay, there is the cap which fits!

So, cap me, the coward,--thus! No fear! A cuff on the brow does good:
The feel of it hinders a worm inside which bores at the brain
for food.
See now, there certainly seems excuse: for a moment, I trust, dear
friends,
The fault was but folly, no fault of mine, or if mine, I have made
amends!

For, every day that is first of May, on the hill-top, here stand I,
Martin Relph, and I strike my brow, and publish the reason why,
When there gathers a crowd to mock the fool. No fool, friends,
since the bite
Of a worm inside is worse to bear: pray God I have balked him quite!

I'll tell you. Certainly much excuse! It came of the way they cooped
Us peasantry up in a ring just here, close huddling because
tight-hooped
By the red-coats round us villagers all: they meant we should see
the sight
And take the example,--see, not speak, for speech was the Captain's
right.

"You clowns on the slope, beware!" cried he: "This woman about to die
Gives by her fate fair warning to such acquaintance as play the spy.
Henceforth who meddle with matters of state above them perhaps will
learn
That peasants should stick to their plough-tail, leave to the King
the King's concern.

"Here's a quarrel that sets the land on fire, between King George
and his foes:
What call has a man of your kind--much less, a woman--to interpose?
Yet you needs must be meddling, folk like you, not foes--so much
the worse!
The many and loyal should keep themselves unmixed with the few
perverse.

"Is the counsel hard to follow? I gave it you plainly a month ago,
And where was the good? The rebels have learned just all that they
need to know.
Not a month since in we quietly marched: a week, and they had the
news,
From a list complete of our rank and file to a note of our caps and
shoes.

"All about all we did and all we were doing and like to do!
Only, I catch a letter by luck, and capture who wrote it, too.
Some of you men look black enough, but the milk-white face demure
Betokens the finger foul with ink: 'tis a woman who writes, be sure!

"Is it 'Dearie, how much I miss your mouth!'--good natural stuff,
she pens?
Some sprinkle of that, for a blind, of course: with talk about
cocks and hens,
How 'robin has built on the apple-tree, and our creeper which came
to grief
Through the frost, we feared, is twining afresh round casement in
famous leaf.'

"But all for a blind! She soon glides frank into 'Horrid the place
is grown
With Officers here and Privates there, no nook we may call our own:
And Farmer Giles has a tribe to house, and lodging will be to seek
For the second Company sure to come ('tis whispered) on Monday week.'

"And so to the end of the chapter! There! The murder you see, was out:
Easy to guess how the change of mind in the rebels was brought about!
Safe in the trap would they now lie snug, had treachery made no sign:
But treachery meets a just reward, no matter if fools malign!

"That traitors had played us false, was proved--sent news which fell
so pat:
And the murder was out--this letter of love, the sender of this sent
that!
'Tis an ugly job, though, all the same--a hateful, to have to deal
With a case of the kind, when a woman's in fault: we soldiers need
nerves of steel!

"So, I gave her a chance, despatched post-haste a message to
Vincent Parkes
Whom she wrote to; easy to find he was, since one of the King's
own clerks,
Ay, kept by the King's own gold in the town close by where the
rebels camp:
A sort of a lawyer, just the man to betray our sort--the scamp!

"'If her writing is simple and honest and only the lover-like stuff
it looks,
And if you yourself are a loyalist, nor down in the rebels' books,
Come quick,' said I, 'and in person prove you are each of you clear
of crime,
Or martial law must take its course: this day next week's the time!'

"Next week is now: does he come? Not he! Clean gone, our clerk, in
a trice!
He has left his sweetheart here in the lurch: no need of a warning
twice!
His own neck free, but his partner's fast in the noose still, here
she stands
To pay for her fault. 'Tis an ugly job: but soldiers obey commands.

"And hearken wherefore I make a speech! Should any acquaintance share
The folly that led to the fault that is now to be punished, let fools
beware!
Look black, if you please, but keep hands white: and, above all else,
keep wives--
Or sweethearts or what they may be--from ink! Not a word now, on your
lives!"

Black? but the Pit's own pitch was white to the Captain's face--the
brute
With the bloated cheeks and the bulgy nose and the bloodshot eyes
to suit!
He was muddled with wine, they say: more like, he was out of his
wits with fear;
He had but a handful of men, that's true,--a riot might cost him
dear.

And all that time stood Rosamund Page, with pinioned arms and face
Bandaged about, on the turf marked out for the party's firing-place.
I hope she was wholly with God: I hope 'twas His angel stretched
a hand
To steady her so, like the shape of stone you see in our
church-aisle stand.

I hope there was no vain fancy pierced the bandage to vex her eyes,
No face within which she missed without, no questions and no replies--
"Why did you leave me to die?"--"Because...." Oh, fiends, too soon
you grin
At merely a moment of hell, like that--such heaven as hell ended in!

Let mine end too! He gave the word, up went the guns in a line.
Those heaped on the hill were blind as dumb,--for, of all eyes,
only mine
Looked over the heads of the foremost rank. Some fell on their knees
in prayer,
Some sank to the earth, but all shut eyes, with a sole exception
there.

That was myself, who had stolen up last, had sidled behind the group:
I am highest of all on the hill-top, there stand fixed while the
others stoop!
From head to foot in a serpent's twine am I tightened: _I_ touch
ground?
No more than a gibbet's rigid corpse which the fetters rust around!

Can I speak, can I breathe, can I burst--aught else but see, see,
only see?
And see I do--for there comes in sight--a man, it sure must be!--
Who staggeringly, stumblingly rises, falls, rises, at random flings
his weight
On and on, anyhow onward--a man that's mad he arrives too late!

Else why does he wave a something white high-flourished above his
head?
Why does not he call, cry,--curse the fool!--why throw up his arms
instead?
O take his fist in your own face, fool! Why does not yourself shout
"Stay!
Here's a man comes rushing, might and main, with something he's mad
to say?"

And a minute, only a moment, to have hell-fire boil up in your brain,
And ere you can judge things right, choose heaven,--time's over,
repentance vain!
They level: a volley, a smoke and the clearing of smoke: I see no more
Of the man smoke hid, nor his frantic arms, nor the something white
he bore.

But stretched on the field, some half-mile off, is an object. Surely
dumb,
Deaf, blind were we struck, that nobody heard, not one of us saw him
come!
Has he fainted through fright? One may well believe! What is it he
holds so fast?
Turn him over, examine the face! Heyday! What, Vincent Parkes at last?

Dead! dead as she, by the self-same shot: one bullet has ended both,
Her in the body and him in the soul. They laugh at our plighted troth.
"Till death us do part?" Till death us do join past parting--that
sounds like
Betrothal indeed! O Vincent Parkes, what need has my fist to strike?

I helped you: thus were you dead and wed: one bound, and your soul
reached hers!
There is clenched in your hand the thing, signed, sealed, the paper
which plain avers
She is innocent, innocent, plain as print, with the King's Arms
broad engraved:
No one can hear, but if any one high on the hill can see, she's saved!

And torn his garb and bloody his lips with heart-break--plain it grew
How the week's delay had been brought about: each guess at the end
proved true.
It was hard to get at the folk in power: such waste of time! and
then
Such pleading and praying, with, all the while, his lamb in the
lion's den!

And at length when he wrung their pardon out, no end to the stupid
forms--
The license and leave: I make no doubt--what wonder if passion warms
The pulse in a man if you play with his heart?--he was something
hasty in speech;
Anyhow, none would quicken the work: he had to beseech, beseech!

And the thing once signed, sealed, safe in his grasp,--what followed
but fresh delays?
For the floods were out, he was forced to take such a roundabout of
ways!
And 'twas "Halt there!" at every turn of the road, since he had to
cross the thick
Of the red-coats: what did they care for him and his "Quick, for
God's sake, quick!"

Horse? but he had one: had it how long? till the first knave smirked
"You brag
Yourself a friend of the King's? then lend to a King's friend here
your nag!"
Money to buy another? Why, piece by piece they plundered him still,
With their "Wait you must;--no help: if aught can help you, a guinea
will!"

And a borough there was--I forget the name--whose Mayor must have
the bench
Of Justices ranged to clear a doubt: for "Vincent," thinks he,
sounds French!
It well may have driven him daft, God knows! all man can certainly
know
Is--rushing and falling and rising, at last he arrived in a
horror--so!

When a word, cry, gasp, would have rescued both! Ay bite me! The
worm begins
At his work once more. Had cowardice proved--that only--my sin of
sins!
Friends, look you here! Suppose ... suppose.... But mad I am, needs
must be!
Judas the Damned would never have dared such a sin as I dream! For,
see!

Suppose I had sneakingly loved her myself, my wretched self, and
dreamed
In the heart of me "She were better dead than happy and his!"--while
gleamed
A light from hell as I spied the pair in a perfectest embrace,
He the savior and she the saved,--bliss born of the very murder-place!

No! Say I was scared, friends! Call me fool and coward, but nothing
worse!
Jeer at the fool and gibe at the coward! 'Twas ever the coward's
curse
That fear breeds fancies in such: such take their shadow for
substance still,
--A fiend at their back. I liked poor Parkes,--loved Vincent, if
you will!

And her--why, I said "Good morrow" to her, "Good even," and nothing
more:
The neighborly way! She was just to me as fifty had been before.
So, coward it is and coward shall be! There's a friend, now!
Thanks! A drink
Of water I wanted: and now I can walk, get home by myself, I think.

This poem, on an incident in Clive's life, is also included on account of its English historical setting.

The remarkable career of Robert Clive cannot be gone into here. Suffice it to refresh one's memory with a few principal events of his life. He was born in Shopshire in 1725. He entered the service of the East India Company at eighteen and was sent to Madras. Here, on account of his falling into debt, and being in danger of losing his situation, he twice tried to shoot himself. The pistol failed to go off, however, and he became impressed with the idea that some great destiny was awaiting him. His feeling was fully realized as his subsequent career in India shows. At twenty-seven, when he returned to England he had made the English the first military power in India. On his return to India (1755-59) he took a further step and secured for the English a political supremacy. Finally, on his last visit, he crowned his earlier exploits by putting the English dominance on a sounder basis of integrity than it had before been.

The incident related in the poem by the old man, Browning heard from Mrs. Jameson, who had shortly before heard it from Macaulay at Lansdowne House. Macaulay mentions it in his essay: "Of his personal courage he had, while still a writer [clerk] given signal proof by a desperate duel with a military bully who was the terror of Fort St. David."

The old gentleman in the poem evidently mixed up his dates slightly, for he says this incident occurred when Clive was twenty-one, and he represents him as committing suicide twenty-five years afterwards. Clive was actually forty-nine when he took his own life.

CLIVE

I and Clive were friends--and why not? Friends! I think you laugh,
my lad.
Clive it was gave England India, while your father gives--egad,
England nothing but the graceless boy who lures him on to speak--
"Well, Sir, you and Clive were comrades--" with a tongue thrust in
your cheek!
Very true: in my eyes, your eyes, all the world's eyes, Clive was man,
I was, am and ever shall be--mouse, nay, mouse of all its clan
Sorriest sample, if you take the kitchen's estimate for fame;
While the man Clive--he fought Plassy, spoiled the clever foreign
game,
Conquered and annexed and Englished!
Never mind! As o'er my punch
(You away) I sit of evenings,--silence, save for biscuit-crunch,
Black, unbroken,--thought grows busy, thrids each pathway of old
years,
Notes this forthright, that meander, till the long-past life appears
Like an outspread map of country plodded through, each mile and rood,
Once, and well remembered still: I'm startled in my solitude
Ever and anon by--what's the sudden mocking light that breaks
On me as I slap the table till no rummer-glass but shakes
While I ask--aloud, I do believe, God help me!--"Was it thus?
Can it be that so I faltered, stopped when just one step for us--"
(Us,--you were not born, I grant, but surely some day born would be)
"--One bold step had gained a province" (figurative talk, you see)
"Got no end of wealth and honor,--yet I stood stock still no less?"
--"For I was not Clive," you comment: but it needs no Clive to guess
Wealth were handy, honor ticklish, did no writing on the wall
Warn me "Trespasser, 'ware man-traps!" Him who braves that
notice--call
Hero! none of such heroics suit myself who read plain words,
Doff my hat, and leap no barrier. Scripture says the land's the
Lord's:
Louts them--what avail the thousand, noisy in a smock-frocked ring,
All-agog to have me trespass, clear the fence, be Clive their king?
Higher warrant must you show me ere I set one foot before
T'other in that dark direction, though I stand for evermore
Poor as Job and meek as Moses. Evermore? No! By-and-by
Job grows rich and Moses valiant, Clive turns out less wise than I.
Don't object "Why call him friend, then?" Power is power, my boy,
and still
Marks a man,--God's gift magnific, exercised for good or ill.
You've your boot now on my hearth-rug, tread what was a tiger's skin:
Rarely such a royal monster as I lodged the bullet in!
True, he murdered half a village, so his own death came to pass;
Still, for size and beauty, cunning, courage--ah, the brute he was!
Why, that Clive,--that youth, that greenhorn, that quill-driving
clerk, in fine,--
He sustained a siege in Arcot.... But the world knows! Pass the wine.

Where did I break off at? How bring Clive in? Oh, you mentioned
"fear"!
Just so: and, said I, that minds me of a story you shall hear.

We were friends then, Clive and I: so, when the clouds, about the orb
Late supreme, encroaching slowly, surely, threatened to absorb
Ray by ray its noontide brilliance,--friendship might, with
steadier eye
Drawing near, bear what had burned else, now no blaze--all majesty.
Too much bee's-wing floats my figure? Well, suppose a castle's new:
None presume to climb its ramparts, none find foothold sure for shoe
'Twixt those squares and squares of granite plating the impervious
pile
As his scale-mail's warty iron cuirasses a crocodile.
Reels that castle thunder-smitten, storm-dismantled? From without
Scrambling up by crack and crevice, every cockney prates about
Towers--the heap he kicks now! turrets--just the measure of his cane!
Will that do? Observe moreover--(same similitude again)--
Such a castle seldom crumbles by sheer stress of cannonade:
'Tis when foes are foiled and fighting's finished that vile rains
invade,
Grass o'ergrows, o'ergrows till night-birds congregating find no holes
Fit to build in like the topmost sockets made for banner-poles.
So Clive crumbled slow in London--crashed at last.

A week before,
Dining with him,--after trying churchyard-chat of days of yore,--
Both of us stopped, tired as tombstones, head-piece, foot-piece,
when they lean
Each to other, drowsed in fog-smoke, o'er a coffined Past between.
As I saw his head sink heavy, guessed the soul's extinguishment
By the glazing eyeball, noticed how the furtive fingers went
Where a drug-box skulked behind the honest liquor,--"One more throw
Try for Clive!" thought I: "Let's venture some good rattling
question!" So--
"Come, Clive, tell us"--out I blurted--"what to tell in turn,
years hence,
When my boy--suppose I have one--asks me on what evidence
I maintain my friend of Plassy proved a warrior every whit
Worth your Alexanders, CÊsars, Marlboroughs and--what said Pitt?--
Frederick the Fierce himself! Clive told me once"--I want to say--
"Which feat out of all those famous doings bore the bell away
--In his own calm estimation, mark you, not the mob's rough guess--
Which stood foremost as evincing what Clive called courageousness!
Come! what moment of the minute, what speck-center in the wide
Circle of the action saw your mortal fairly deified?
(Let alone that filthy sleep-stuff, swallow bold this wholesome Port!)
If a friend has leave to question,--when were you most brave, in
short?"

Up he arched his brows o' the instant--formidably Clive again.
"When was I most brave? I'd answer, were the instance half as plain
As another instance that's a brain-lodged crystal--curse it!--here
Freezing when my memory touches--ugh!--the time I felt most fear.
Ugh! I cannot say for certain if I showed fear--anyhow,
Fear I felt, and, very likely, shuddered, since I shiver now."

"Fear!" smiled I. "Well, that's the rarer: that's a specimen to seek,
Ticket up in one's museum, _Mind-Freaks_, _Lord Clive's Fear_,
_Unique_!"

Down his brows dropped. On the table painfully he pored as though
Tracing, in the stains and streaks there, thoughts encrusted long ago.
When he spoke 'twas like a lawyer reading word by word some will,
Some blind jungle of a statement,--beating on and on until
Out there leaps fierce life to fight with.

"This fell in my factor-days.
Desk-drudge, slaving at St. David's, one must game, or drink, or
craze.
I chose gaming: and,--because your high-flown gamesters hardly take
Umbrage at a factor's elbow if the factor pays his stake,--
I was winked at in a circle where the company was choice,
Captain This and Major That, men high of color, loud of voice,
Yet indulgent, condescending to the modest juvenile
Who not merely risked but lost his hard-earned guineas with a smile.

"Down I sat to cards, one evening,--had for my antagonist
Somebody whose name's a secret--you'll know why--so, if you list,
Call him Cock o' the Walk, my scarlet son of Mars from head to heel!
Play commenced: and, whether Cocky fancied that a clerk must feel
Quite sufficient honor came of bending over one green baize,
I the scribe with him the warrior,--guessed no penman dared to raise
Shadow of objection should the honor stay but playing end
More or less abruptly,--whether disinclined he grew to spend
Practice strictly scientific on a booby born to stare
At--not ask of--lace-and-ruffles if the hand they hide plays fair,--
Anyhow, I marked a movement when he bade me 'Cut!'

"I rose.
'Such the new manoeuvre, Captain? I'm a novice: knowledge grows.
What, you force a card, you cheat, Sir?'

"Never did a thunder-clap
Cause emotion, startle Thyrsis locked with Chloe in his lap,
As my word and gesture (down I flung my cards to join the pack)
Fired the man of arms, whose visage, simply red before, turned black.

"When he found his voice, he stammered 'That expression once again!'

"'Well, you forced a card and cheated!'

"'Possibly a factor's brain,
Busied with his all-important balance of accounts, may deem
Weighing words superfluous trouble: _cheat_ to clerkly ears may seem
Just the joke for friends to venture: but we are not friends, you see!
When a gentleman is joked with,--if he's good at repartee,
He rejoins, as do I--Sirrah, on your knees, withdraw in full!
Beg my pardon, or be sure a kindly bullet through your skull
Lets in light and teaches manners to what brain it finds! Choose
quick--
Have your life snuffed out or, kneeling, pray me trim yon
candle-wick!'

"'Well, you cheated!'

"Then outbroke a howl from all the friends
around.
To his feet sprang each in fury, fists were clenched and teeth were
ground.
'End it! no time like the present! Captain, yours were our disgrace!
No delay, begin and finish! Stand back, leave the pair a space!
Let civilians be instructed: henceforth simply ply the pen,
Fly the sword! This clerk's no swordsman? Suit him with a pistol,
then!
Even odds! A dozen paces 'twixt the most and least expert
Make a dwarf a giant's equal: nay, the dwarf, if he's alert,
Likelier hits the broader target!'

"Up we stood accordingly.
As they handed me the weapon, such was my soul's thirst to try
Then and there conclusions with this bully, tread on and stamp out
Every spark of his existence, that,--crept close to, curled about
By that toying tempting teasing fool-fore-finger's middle joint,--
Don't you guess?--the trigger yielded. Gone my chance! and at the
point
Of such prime success moreover: scarce an inch above his head
Went my ball to hit the wainscot. He was living, I was dead.

"Up he marched in flaming triumph--'twas his right, mind!--up, within
Just an arm's length. 'Now, my clerkling,' chuckled Cocky with a grin
As the levelled piece quite touched me, 'Now, Sir Counting-House,
repeat
That expression which I told you proved bad manners! Did I cheat?'

"'Cheat you did, you knew you cheated, and, this moment, know as well.
As for me, my homely breeding bids you--fire and go to Hell!'

"Twice the muzzle touched my forehead. Heavy barrel, flurried wrist,
Either spoils a steady lifting. Thrice: then, 'Laugh at Hell who list,
I can't! God's no fable either. Did this boy's eye wink once? No!
There's no standing him and Hell and God all three against me,--so,
I did cheat!'

"And down he threw the pistol, out rushed--by the door
Possibly, but, as for knowledge if by chimney, roof or floor,
He effected disappearance--I'll engage no glance was sent
That way by a single starer, such a blank astonishment
Swallowed up their senses: as for speaking--mute they stood as mice.

"Mute not long, though! Such reaction, such a hubbub in a trice!
'Rogue and rascal! Who'd have thought it? What's to be expected next,
When His Majesty's Commission serves a sharper as pretext
For.... But where's the need of wasting time now? Nought requires
delay:
Punishment the Service cries for: let disgrace be wiped away
Publicly, in good broad daylight! Resignation? No, indeed
Drum and fife must play the Rogue's March, rank and file be free to
speed
Tardy marching on the rogue's part by appliance in the rear
--Kicks administered shall right this wronged civilian,--never fear,
Mister Clive, for--though a clerk--you bore yourself--suppose we say--
Just as would beseem a soldier!'

"'Gentlemen, attention--pray!
First, one word!'

"I passed each speaker severally in review.
When I had precise their number, names and styles, and fully knew
Over whom my supervision thenceforth must extend,--why, then----

"'Some five minutes since, my life lay--as you all saw, gentlemen--
At the mercy of your friend there. Not a single voice was raised
In arrest of judgment, not one tongue--before my powder blazed--
Ventured "Can it be the youngster blundered, really seemed to mark
Some irregular proceeding? We conjecture in the dark,
Guess at random,--still, for sake of fair play--what if for a freak,
In a fit of absence,--such things have been!--if our friend proved
weak
--What's the phrase?--corrected fortune! Look into the case, at
least!"
Who dared interpose between the altar's victim and the priest?
Yet he spared me! You eleven! Whosoever, all or each,
To the disadvantage of the man who spared me, utters speech
--To his face, behind his back,--that speaker has to do with me:
Me who promise, if positions change and mine the chance should be,
Not to imitate your friend and waive advantage!'

"Twenty-five
Years ago this matter happened: and 'tis certain," added Clive,
"Never, to my knowledge, did Sir Cocky have a single breath
Breathed against him: lips were closed throughout his life, or
since his death,
For if he be dead or living I can tell no more than you.
All I know is--Cocky had one chance more; how he used it,--grew
Out of such unlucky habits, or relapsed, and back again
Brought the late-ejected devil with a score more in his train,--
That's for you to judge. Reprieval I procured, at any rate.
Ugh--the memory of that minute's fear makes gooseflesh rise! Why prate
Longer? You've my story, there's your instance: fear I did, you see!"

"Well"--I hardly kept from laughing--"if I see it, thanks must be
Wholly to your Lordship's candor. Not that--in a common case--
When a bully caught at cheating thrusts a pistol in one's face,
I should underrate, believe me, such a trial to the nerve!
'Tis no joke, at one-and-twenty, for a youth to stand nor swerve.
Fear I naturally look for--unless, of all men alive,
I am forced to make exception when I come to Robert Clive.
Since at Arcot, Plassy, elsewhere, he and death--the whole world
knows--
Came to somewhat closer quarters."
Quarters? Had we come to blows,
Clive and I, you had not wondered--up he sprang so, out he rapped
Such a round of oaths--no matter! I'll endeavor to adapt
To our modern usage words he--well, 'twas friendly license--flung
At me like so many fire-balls, fast as he could wag his tongue.

"You--a soldier? You--at Plassy? Yours the faculty to nick
Instantaneously occasion when your foe, if lightning-quick,
--At his mercy, at his malice,--has you, through some stupid inch
Undefended in your bulwark? Thus laid open,--not to flinch
--That needs courage, you'll concede me. Then, look here! Suppose
the man,
Checking his advance, his weapon still extended, not a span
Distant from my temple,--curse him!--quietly had bade me 'There!
Keep your life, calumniator!--worthless life I freely spare:
Mine you freely would have taken--murdered me and my good fame
Both at once--and all the better! Go, and thank your own bad aim
Which permits me to forgive you!' What if, with such words as these,
He had cast away his weapon? How should I have borne me, please?
Nay, I'll spare you pains and tell you. This, and only this,
remained--
Pick his weapon up and use it on myself. I so had gained
Sleep the earlier, leaving England probably to pay on still
Rent and taxes for half India, tenant at the Frenchman's will."

"Such the turn," said I, "the matter takes with you? Then I abate
--No, by not one jot nor tittle,--of your act my estimate.
Fear--I wish I could detect there: courage fronts me, plain enough--
Call it desperation, madness--never mind! for here's in rough
Why, had mine been such a trial, fear had overcome disgrace.
True, disgrace were hard to bear: but such a rush against God's face
--None of that for me, Lord Plassy, since I go to church at times,
Say the creed my mother taught me! Many years in foreign climes
Rub some marks away--not all, though! We poor sinners reach life's
brink,
Overlook what rolls beneath it, recklessly enough, but think
There's advantage in what's left us--ground to stand on, time to call
'Lord, have mercy!' ere we topple over--do not leap, that's all!"

Oh, he made no answer,--re-absorbed into his cloud. I caught
Something like "Yes--courage: only fools will call it fear."
If aught
Comfort you, my great unhappy hero Clive, in that I heard,
Next week, how your own hand dealt you doom, and uttered just the word
"Fearfully courageous!"--this, be sure, and nothing else I groaned.
I'm no Clive, nor parson either: Clive's worst deed--we'll hope
condoned.