“Ye know the turn of the pass forninst Jumrood and the nine mile road
on the flat to Peshawur? All Peshawur was along that road day and night
waitin' for frinds--men, women, childer, and bands. Some av the throops
was camped round Jumrood, an' some went on to Peshawur to get away down
to their cantonmints. We came through in the early mornin', havin' been
awake the night through, and we dhruv sheer into the middle av the mess.
Mother av Glory, will I ever forget that comin' back? The light was not
fair lifted, and the furst we heard was 'For 'tis my delight av a shiny
night,' frum a band that thought we was the second four comp'nies av the
Lincolnshire. At that we was forced to sind them a yell to say who we
was, an' thin up wint 'The wearin' av the Green.' It made me crawl all
up my backbone, not havin' taken my brequist. Thin, right smash into our
rear, came fwhat was left av the Jock Elliotts--wid four pipers an' not
half a kilt among thim, playin' for the dear life, an' swingin' their
rumps like buck rabbits, an' a native rig'mint shrieking blue murther.
Ye niver heard the like. There was men cryin' like women that did--an'
faith I do not blame thim. Fwhat bruk me down was the Lancers'
Band--shinin' an' spick like angels, wid the ould dhrum-horse at the
head an' the silver kettle-dhrums an' all an' all, waitin' for their
men that was behind us. They shtruck up the Cavalry Canter, an', begad,
those poor ghosts that had not a sound fut in a throop they answered to
ut, the men rockin' in their saddles. We thried to cheer them as they
wint by, but ut came out like a big gruntin' cough, so there must have
been many that was feelin' like me. Oh, but I'm forgettin'! The
Fly-by-Nights was waitin' for their second battalion, an' whin ut came
out, there was the Colonel's horse led at the head--saddle-empty. The
men fair worshipped him, an' he'd died at Au Musjid on the road down.
They waited till the remnint av the battalion was up, and thin--clane
against ordhers, for who wanted that chune that day?--they wint back to
Peshawur slow-time an' tearin' the bowils out av ivry man that heard,
wid 'The Dead March.' Right across our line they wint, an' ye know their
uniforms are as black as the Sweeps, crawlin' past like the dead, an'
the other bands damnin' them to let be.
“Little they cared. The carpse was wid them, an' they'd ha' taken ut so
through a Coronation. Our ordhers was to go into Peshawur, an' we wint
hot-fut past the Fly-by-Nights, not singin', to lave that chune behind
us. That was how we tuk the road of the other corps.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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