Complete Poetical Works by Bret Harte Part 7

XIV

The strain was finished; softly as the night Her voice died from the window, yet e'en then Fluttered and fell likewise a kerchief white; But that no doubt was accident, for when She sought her couch she deemed her conduct quite Beyond the reach of scandalous commenter,-- Was.h.i.+ng her hands of either gallant wight, Knowing the moralist might compliment her,-- Thus voicing Siren with the words of Mentor.

XV

She little knew the youths below, who straight Dived for her kerchief, and quite overlooked The pregnant moral she would inculcate; Nor dreamed the less how little Winthrop brooked Her right to doubt his soul's maturer state.

Brown--who was Western, amiable, and new-- Might take the moral and accept his fate; The which he did, but, being stronger too, Took the white kerchief, also, as his due.

XVI

They did not quarrel, which no doubt seemed queer To those who knew not how their friends.h.i.+p blended; Each was opposed, and each the other's peer, Yet each the other in some things transcended.

Where Brown lacked culture, brains,--and oft, I fear, Cash in his pocket,--Grey of course supplied him; Where Grey lacked frankness, force, and faith sincere, Brown of his manhood suffered none to chide him, But in his faults stood manfully beside him.

XVII

In academic walks and studies grave, In the camp drill and martial occupation, They helped each other: but just here I crave s.p.a.ce for the reader's full imagination,-- The fact is patent, Grey became a slave!

A tool, a f.a.g, a "pleb"! To state it plainer, All that blue blood and ancestry e'er gave Cleaned guns, brought water!--was, in fact, retainer To Jones, whose uncle was a paper-stainer!

XVIII

How they bore this at home I cannot say: I only know so runs the gossip's tale.

It chanced one day that the paternal Grey Came to West Point that he himself might hail The future hero in some proper way Consistent with his lineage. With him came A judge, a poet, and a brave array Of aunts and uncles, bearing each a name, Eyegla.s.s and respirator with the same.

XIX

"Observe!" quoth Grey the elder to his friends, "Not in these giddy youths at baseball playing You'll notice Winthrop Adams! Greater ends Than these absorb HIS leisure. No doubt straying With Caesar's Commentaries, he attends Some Roman council. Let us ask, however, Yon grimy urchin, who my soul offends By wheeling offal, if he will endeavor To find-- What! heaven! Winthrop! Oh! no! never!"

XX

Alas! too true! The last of all the Greys Was "doing police detail,"--it had come To this; in vain the rare historic bays That crowned the pictured Puritans at home!

And yet 'twas certain that in grosser ways Of health and physique he was quite improving.

Straighter he stood, and had achieved some praise In other exercise, much more behooving A soldier's taste than merely dirt removing.

XXI

But to resume: we left the youthful pair, Some stanzas back, before a lady's bower; 'Tis to be hoped they were no longer there, For stars were pointing to the morning hour.

Their escapade discovered, ill 'twould fare With our two heroes, derelict of orders; But, like the ghost, they "scent the morning air,"

And back again they steal across the borders, Unseen, unheeded, by their martial warders.

XXII

They got to bed with speed: young Grey to dream Of some vague future with a general's star, And Mistress Kitty basking in its gleam; While Brown, content to wors.h.i.+p her afar, Dreamed himself dying by some lonely stream, Having s.n.a.t.c.hed Kitty from eighteen Nez Perces, Till a far bugle, with the morning beam, In his dull ear its fateful song rehea.r.s.es, Which Winthrop Adams after put to verses.

XXIII

So pa.s.sed three years of their novitiate, The first real boyhood Grey had ever known.

His youth ran clear,--not choked like his Cochituate, In civic pipes, but free and pure alone; Yet knew repression, could himself habituate To having mind and body well rubbed down, Could read himself in others, and could situate Themselves in him,--except, I grieve to own, He couldn't see what Kitty saw in Brown!

XXIV

At last came graduation; Brown received In the One Hundredth Cavalry commission; Then frolic, flirting, parting,--when none grieved Save Brown, who loved our young Academician.

And Grey, who felt his friend was still deceived By Mistress Kitty, who with other beauties Graced the occasion, and it was believed Had promised Brown that when he could recruit his Promised command, she'd share with him those duties.

XXV

Howe'er this was I know not; all I know, The night was June's, the moon rode high and clear; "'Twas such a night as this," three years ago, Miss Kitty sang the song that two might hear.

There is a walk where trees o'erarching grow, Too wide for one, not wide enough for three (A fact precluding any plural beau), Which quite explained Miss Kitty's company, But not why Grey that favored one should be.

XXVI

There is a spring, whose limpid waters hide Somewhere within the shadows of that path Called Kosciusko's. There two figures bide,-- Grey and Miss Kitty. Surely Nature hath No fairer mirror for a might-be bride Than this same pool that caught our gentle belle To its dark heart one moment. At her side Grey bent. A something trembled o'er the well, Bright, spherical--a tear? Ah no! a b.u.t.ton fell!

XXVII

"Material minds might think that gravitation,"

Quoth Grey, "drew yon metallic spheroid down.

The soul poetic views the situation Fraught with more meaning. When thy girlish crown Was mirrored there, there was disintegration Of me, and all my spirit moved to you, Taking the form of slow precipitation!"

But here came "Taps," a start, a smile, adieu!

A blush, a sigh, and end of Canto II.

BUGLE SONG

Fades the light, And afar Goeth day, cometh night; And a star Leadeth all, Speedeth all To their rest!

Love, good-night!

Must thou go When the day And the light Need thee so,-- Needeth all, Heedeth all, That is best?

CANTO III

I

Where the sun sinks through leagues of arid sky, Where the sun dies o'er leagues of arid plain, Where the dead bones of wasted rivers lie, Trailed from their channels in yon mountain chain; Where day by day naught takes the wearied eye But the low-r.i.m.m.i.n.g mountains, sharply based On the dead levels, moving far or nigh, As the sick vision wanders o'er the waste, But ever day by day against the sunset traced:

II

There moving through a poisonous cloud that stings With dust of alkali the trampling band Of Indian ponies, ride on dusky wings The red marauders of the Western land; Heavy with spoil, they seek the trail that brings Their flaunting lances to that sheltered bank Where lie their lodges; and the river sings Forgetful of the plain beyond, that drank Its life blood, where the wasted caravan sank.

III

They brought with them the thief's ign.o.ble spoil, The beggar's dole, the greed of chiffonnier, The sc.u.m of camps, the implements of toil s.n.a.t.c.hed from dead hands, to rust as useless here; All they could rake or glean from hut or soil Piled their lean ponies, with the jackdaw's greed For vacant glitter. It were scarce a foil To all this tinsel that one feathered reed Bore on its barb two scalps that freshly bleed!

IV

They brought with them, alas! a wounded foe, Bound hand and foot, yet nursed with cruel care, Lest that in death he might escape one throe They had decreed his living flesh should bear: A youthful officer, by one foul blow Of treachery surprised, yet fighting still Amid his ambushed train, calm as the snow Above him; hopeless, yet content to spill His blood with theirs, and fighting but to kill.

V

He had fought n.o.bly, and in that brief spell Had won the awe of those rude border men Who gathered round him, and beside him fell In loyal faith and silence, save that when By smoke embarra.s.sed, and near sight as well, He paused to wipe his eyegla.s.s, and decide Its nearer focus, there arose a yell Of approbation, and Bob Barker cried, "Wade in, Dundreary!" tossed his cap and--died.