But to-day I leave the galley and another takes my place; There’s my name upon the deck-beam--let it stand a little space. I am free--to watch my messmates beating out to open main Free of all that Life can offer--save to handle sweep again. By the brand upon my shoulder, by the gall of clinging steel, By the welt the whips have left me, by the scars that never heal; By eyes grown old with staring through the sunwash on the brine, I am paid in full for service--would that service still were mine! Yet they talk of times and seasons and of woe the years bring forth, Of our galley swamped and shattered in the rollers of the North. When the niggers break the hatches and the decks are gay with gore, And a craven-hearted pilot crams her crashing on the shore. She will need no half-mast signal, minute-gun, or rocket-flare, When the cry for help goes seaward, she will find her servants there. Battered chain-gangs of the orlop, grizzled drafts of years gone by, To the bench that broke their manhood, they shall lash themselves and die. Hale and crippled, young and aged, paid, deserted, shipped away-- Palace, cot, and lazaretto shall make up the tale that day, When the skies are black above them, and the decks ablaze beneath, And the topmen clear the raffle with their clasp-knives in their teeth. It may be that Fate will give me life and leave to row once more-- Set some strong man free for fighting as I take awhile his oar. But to-day I leave the galley. Shall I curse her service then? God be thanked--whate’er comes after, I have lived and toiled with Men! _Rudyard Kipling._ VII SOUTH AFRICA PRINGLE CCXIII THE DESOLATE VALLEY Far up among the forest-belted mountains, Where Winterberg, stern giant old and grey, Looks down the subject dells, whose gleaming fountains To wizard Kat their virgin tribute pay, A valley opens to the noontide ray, With green savannahs shelving to the brim Of the swift river, sweeping on its way To where Umtóka tries to meet with him, Like a blue serpent gliding through the acacias dim. There, couched at night in hunter’s wattled shieling, How wildly-beautiful it was to hear The elephant his shrill _reveillé_ pealing, Like some far signal-trumpet on the ear! While the broad midnight moon was shining clear, How fearful to look forth upon the woods, And see those stately forest-kings appear, Emerging from their shadowy solitudes-- As if that trump had woke Earth’s old gigantic broods!