From Mine Own People by Rudyard Kipling
page 50 of 1159 (04%)
page 50 of 1159 (04%)
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Pray, brothers, pray, but to no earthly King--
Lift up your hands above the blighted grain, Look westward--if they please, the Gods shall bring Their mercy with the rain. Look westward--bears the blue no brown cloud-bank? Nay, it is written--wherefore should we fly? On our own field and by our cattle's flank Lie down, lie down to die! Semi-Chorus By the plumed heads of Kings Waving high, Where the tall corn springs O'er the dead. If they rust or rot we die, If they ripen we are fed. Very mighty is the power of our Kings! Triumphal return to Simla of the Investigators, attired after the manner of Dionysus, leading a pet tiger-cub in wreaths of rhubarb-leaves, symbolical of India under medical treatment. They sing:-- We have seen, we have written--behold it, the proof of our manifold toil! In their hosts they assembled and told it--the tale of the Sons of the Soil. |
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