THE LAST OF THE LIGHT BRIGADE

Te Aroha News, Volume VII, Issue 482, 21 June 1890, Page 6

THE LAST OF THE LIGHT BRIGADE

[“£24 represented the response, so'far, of the British public to the appeal made by the Committee for funds to enable provision to be made for the declining days of those of the survivors of the Balaclava Charge who are known to have come to misery and want, and whose number now scarcely exceeds twenty. .... A few shillings weekly could be granted to the necessitous survivors .... and thereby relieve the minds of the recipients from the fear of starvation and the dread of the workhouse, See Daily Papers.] There were thirty million Hnglish who talked of England’s might, There were twenty broken troopers who lacked a bed for the night; They had neither food nor money, they had neither service nor trade— They were only shiftless soldiers -the last of the Light Brigade. They felt that Life was fleeting; they knew not Art was long, Or, though they were dying of famine, tV.ey lived in deathless song. They asked for a little money, to keep the wolf from the door; And the thirty million English sent twenty pounds and four. They laid tlieir heads together that were scarred and lined and grey— Keen were the Russian sabres, but Want was keener than they; And an old troop-sergeant muttered, “Let’s go to the man who writes The things on Balaclava the kiddies at school recites.” They went without band or colours - a regiment ten-file strong— To look for the Master-Singer who had crowned them all in his song; And, waiting his servant’s order, by the gardengate they stayed— A desolate little cluster, the last of the Light Brigade. They strove to stand to attention, to straight an the toil-bowed back— They drilled on an empty stomach—the looseknit files fell slack; With stooping of weary shoulders, in garments tattered and frayed. They shambled into his presence—the last of the Light Brigade. The old Troop-sergeant was spokesman, and, “ Beggin’ your pardon," he said, “ You wrote o’ the Light Brigade, sir. Here's all that isn’t dead. An’ it’s all come true what you wrote, sir, regardin’ the mouth of Hell; For we’re all of us nigh to the workhouse, an we thought we’d call an’ tell. “ No, thank you; we don’t want food, sir; but couldn’t you take an’ write A sort of ‘to be continued,’ and ‘see next page’o’the fight? Wc think that some one has blundered, an couldn’t you tell ’em how ? You wrote we were heroes once, sir. Please write, we are starving now.” The poor little army departed, limping and lean and forlorn, And the heart of the Master-Singer grew hot with “ the scorn of scorn And he wrote for them wondrous verses that swept the land like a flame, Till the fatted souls of the English were scourged with the thing called Shame. They sent a cheque to the felon that sprang from an Irish bog, They healed the spavined cab-horse; they housed the homeless dog ; And they sent (you may call me a liar), when rebel and beast were paid. A cheque for—enough to live on, to the la3t of the Light Brigade. O thirty million English that babble of England’s might. Behold, there are twenty heroes who lack thenfood to-night; Our children's children are lisping to “honour the charge they made,’ And wc leave to the streets and the workhouse the charge of the Light Brigade. Rudyakd Kipling.