'We know what Heaven or Hell may bring, 'But no man knoweth the mind of the King. 'Of the grey-coat coming who can say? 'When the night is gathering all is grey. 'Two things greater than all things are,

'The first is Love, and the second War. 'And since we know not how War may prove,

'Heart of my heart, let us talk of Love!'

WITH SCINDIA TO DELHI

More inan a hundred years ago, in a great battle fought near Delhi, an Indian Prince rode fifty miles after the day was lost with a beggar-girl, who had loved him and followed him in all his camps, on his saddle-bow. He lost the girl when almost within sight of safety. A Maratta trooper tells the story:—

THE wreath of banquet overnight lay withered on the neck,

Our hands and scarves were saffron-dyed for signal

of despair,

When we went forth to Paniput to battle with the Mlech,

Ere we came back from Paniput and left a kingdom there.

Thrice thirty-thousand men were we to force the Jumna fords

The hawk-winged horse of Damajee, mailed squadrons of the Bhao,

Copyright, 1892, by Macmillan & Co. 31

Stark levies of the southern hills, the Deccan's sharpest swords,

And he the harlot's traitor son the goatherd Mulhar Rao!

Thrice thirty-thousand men were we before the mists had cleared,

The low white mists of morning heard the war

conch scream and bray;

We called upon Bhowani and we gripped them by the beard,

We rolled upon them like a flood and washed their ranks away.

The children of the hills of Khost before our lances

ran,

We drove the black Rohillas back as cattle to the

pen;

'Twas then we needed Mulhar Rao to end what we

began,

A thousand men had saved the charge; he fled

the field with ten!

There was no room to clear a sword-no power to

strike a blow,

For foot to foot, ay, breast to breast, the battle

held us fast

Save where the naked hill men ran and stabbing from below

Brought down the horse and rider and we trampled them and passed.

To left the roar of musketry rang like a falling flood

To right the sunshine rippled red from redder lance and blade

Above the dark Upsaras1 flew, beneath us plashed the blood,

And, bellying black against the dust, the Bhagwa Jhanda swayed.

I saw it fall in smoke and fire, the banner of the Bhao;

I heard a voice across the press of one who called

in vain :

1 The Choosers of the Slain.

C

'Ho! Anand Rao Nimbalkhur ride! Get aid of

Mulhar Rao!

'Go shame his squadrons into fight-the Bhao— the Bhao is slain!'

Thereat, as when a sand-bar breaks in clotted spume and spray

When rain of later autumn sweeps the Jumna

water-head,

Before their charge from flank to flank our riven ranks gave way;

But of the waters of that flood the Jumna fords ran red.

I held by Scindia, my lord, as close as man might hold;

A Soobah of the Deccan asks no aid to guard his

life;

But Holkar's Horse were flying, and our chiefest chiefs were cold,

And like a flame among us leapt the long lean

Northern knife.