Rudyard Kipling

“ If he can be moved about a little and allowed to watch the effect of his own fire on the enemy he feels merrier, and may be then worked up to the blind passion of fighting which is, contrary to general belief, controlled by a chilly Devil and shakes men like ague. If he is not moved about and begins to feel cold at the pit of the stomach and in that crisis is badly mauled and hears orders that were never given, he will break, and he will break badly; and of all things under the sight of the Sun there is nothing more terrible than a broken British regiment. ”

“ Throughout those five days, in which old soldiers might have taught them the craft of the game, they discussed together their misadventures in the past—how such an one was alive at dawn and dead ere the dusk, and with what shrieks and struggles such another had given up his soul under the Afghan knife. Death was a new and horrible thing to the sons of merchants, who were used to die decently of zymotic disease; and their careful conservation in barracks had done nothing to make them look upon it with less dread. ”

“ What is a 'falchion'? What is a 'e-wee lamb'? What is a 'base ussurper'? What is a 'verdant me-ad'?" he demanded, with flushed cheeks at bed-time of the astonished Aunt Rosa.
"Say your prayers and go to sleep," she replied, and that was all the help Punch then or afterwards found at her hands in the new and delightful exercise of reading.
"Aunt Rosa only knows about God and things like that," argued Punch. "Uncle Harry will tell me."
The next walk proved that Uncle Harry could not help either; but he allowed Punch to talk, and even sat down on a bench to hear about the Griffin. ”

“ Then came days of doing absolutely nothing, of dreaming dreams and marching imaginary armies up and down stairs, of counting the number of banisters, and of measuring the length and breadth of every room in handspans—fifty down the side, thirty across and fifty back again. Jane made many friends, and, after receiving Black Sheep's assurance that he would not tell of her absences, went out daily for long hours. ”

“ Punch, won't you care for me a little?"
It is astonishing how much petting a big boy of ten can endure when he is quite sure that there is no one to laugh at him. Black Sheep had never been made much of before, and here was this beautiful woman treating him—Black Sheep, the Child of the Devil and the Inheritor of Undying Flame—as though he were a small God.
"I care for you a great deal, Mother dear," he whispered at last, "and I'm glad you've come back; but are you sure Aunty Rosa told you everything?" ”

“ Not for anything would they have taken equal liberties with a seasoned corps—with the wicked little Gurkhas, whose delight it was to lie out in the open on a dark night and stalk their stalkers—with the terrible, big men dressed in women's clothes, who could be heard praying to their God in the night-watches, and whose peace of mind no amount of "sniping" could shake—or with those vile Sikhs, who marched so ostentatiously unprepared, and who dealt out such grim reward to those who tried to profit by that unpreparedness. ”

“ The scheme would have succeeded had not Jakin punched him vehemently in the stomach, or had Lew refrained from kicking his shins. They fought together, bleeding and breathless, for half-an-hour, and, after heavy punishment, triumphantly pulled down their opponent as terriers pull down a jackal.
"Now," gasped Jakin, "I'll give you what-for." He proceeded to pound the man's features while Lew stamped on the outlying portions of his anatomy. Chivalry is not a strong point in the composition of the average drummer-boy. He fights, as do his betters, to make his mark. ”

“ A child, under exactly similar circumstances as far as its knowledge goes, cannot very well curse God and die. It howls till its nose is red, its eyes are sore, and its head aches. Punch and Judy, through no fault of their own, had lost all their world. ”

“ Not one man but two or three had appeared from behind the rocks of the hills, and the heart of Wee Willie Winkie sank within him, for just in this manner were the Goblins wont to steal out and vex Curdie's soul. Thus had they played in Curdie's garden, he had seen the picture, and thus had they frightened the Princess's nurse. He heard them talking to each other, and recognized with joy the bastard Pushto that he had picked up from one of his father's saises lately dismissed. People who spoke that tongue could not be the Bad Men. ”

“ Uncle Harry took him for walks and consoled him with rough tenderness, never calling him Black Sheep. "It's good for you, I suppose, Punch," he used to say. "Let us sit down. I'm getting tired." His steps led him now not to the beach, but to the Cemetery of Rocklington amid the potato-fields. For hours the grey man would sit on a tombstone, while Black Sheep read epitaphs, and then with a sigh would stump home again. ”

“ I knew what I did and I want to say so, but Harry always makes it out different somehow, and Aunty Rosa doesn't believe a word I say. Oh Ju, don't you say I'm bad too."
"Aunty Rosa says you are," said Judy. "She told the Vicar so when he came yesterday."
"Why does she tell all the people outside the house about me? It isn't fair," said Black Sheep. "When I was in Bombay, and was bad—doing bad, not made-up bad like this—Mamma told Papa, and Papa told me he knew, and that was all. Outside people didn't know too—even Meeta didn't know." ”

“ Then they felt body to body the amazing physical strength of their foes; a shriek of pain ended the rush, and the knives fell amid scenes not to be told. The men clubbed together and smote blindly—as often as not at their own fellows. Their front crumpled like paper, and the fifty Ghazis passed on; their backers, now drunk with success, fighting as madly as they.
Then the rear-ranks were bidden to close up, and the subalterns dashed into the stew—alone. For the rear-rank had heard the clamour in front, the yells and the howls of pain, and had seen the dark stale blood that makes afraid. ”

“ Judy nodded her head mournfully. Black Sheep turned away in despair, but Judy's arms were round his neck.
"Never mind, Punch," she whispered. "I will speak to you just the same as ever and ever. You're my own own brother though you are—though Aunty Rosa says you're bad, and Harry says you're a little coward. He says that if I pulled your hair hard, you'd cry."
"Pull, then," said Punch. Judy pulled gingerly.
"Pull harder as hard as you can! There! ”

“ Clearly it would not do to pretend to care for Aunty Rosa.
At this point Harry entered and stood afar off, eyeing Punch, a dishevelled heap in the corner of the room, with disgust.
"You're a liar—a young liar," said Harry, with great unction, "and you're to have tea down here because you're not fit to speak to us. And you're not to speak to Judy again till Mother gives you leave. You'll corrupt her. You're only fit to associate with the servant. ”

“ The model of the ship availed nothing, though the grey man assured Punch that he might pull the rigging up and down as much as he pleased; and Judy was promised free entry into the kitchen. They wanted Papa and Mamma gone to Bombay beyond the seas, and their grief while it lasted was without remedy.
When the tears ceased the house was very still. Antirosa had decided it was better to let the children "have their cry out," and the boy had gone to school. Punch raised his head from the floor and sniffed mournfully. Judy was nearly asleep. ”

“ The British soldier is not altogether to be blamed for occasional lapses; but this verdict he should not know. A moderately intelligent General will waste six month mastering the craft of the particular war that he may be waging; a Colonel may utterly misunderstand the capacity of his regiment for three months after it has taken the field; and even a Company Commander may err and be deceived as to the temper and temperament of his own handful: wherefore the soldier, and the soldier of to-day more particularly, should not be blamed for falling back. ”

“ Not to Nassick this year, little Sahib," said Meeta, lifting him on his shoulder. "Down to the sea where the cocoa-nuts are thrown, and across the sea in a big ship. Will you take Meeta with you to Belait?"
"You shall all come," said Punch, from the height of Meeta's strong arms. "Meeta and the ayah and the hamal, and Bhini-in-the-Garden, and the salaam-Captain-Sahib-snake-man." ”

“ If he looks to the right and the left and sees old soldiers men—of twelve years' service, who, he knows, know what they are about—taking a charge, rush or demonstration without embarrassment, he is consoled and applies his shoulder to the butt of his rifle with a stout heart. ”

“ The drummers gnashed their teeth at Jakin and Lew marching with the Band, the married women wept upon the platform, and the regiment cheered its noble self black in the face.
"A nice level lot," said the Colonel to the Second-in-Command as they watched the first four companies entraining.
"Fit to do anything," said the Second-in-Command enthusiastically. "But it seems to me they're a thought too young and tender for the work in hand. It's bitter cold up at the Front now."
"They're sound enough," said the Colonel. "We must take our chance of sick casualties." ”

“ There was much running about and banging of boxes, and Punch curled himself up on the sofa in the dining-room and considered things.
"I don't like these people," said Punch. "But never mind. We'll go away soon. We have always went away soon from everywhere. I wish we was gone back to Bombay soon."
The wish bore no fruit. For six days Mamma wept at intervals, and showed the woman in black all Punch's clothes—a liberty which Punch resented. "But p'raps she's a new white ayah" he thought. "I'm to call her Antirosa, but she doesn't call me Sahib. She says just Punch," he confided to Judy. ”

“ His Mamma was out, so was Miss Biddums, and there was pink string round the packet. He greatly desired pink string. It would help him in many of his little businesses—the haulage across the floor of his small cane-chair, the torturing of Chimo, who could never understand harness—and so forth. If he took the string it would be his own, and nobody would be any the wiser. He certainly could not pluck up sufficient courage to ask Mamma for it. ”

“ Their officers are as good as good can be, because their training begins early, and has arranged that a clean-run youth of the British middle-classes shall, in the matter of backbone, brains and bowels, surpass all other youths. For this reason a child of eighteen will stand up, doing nothing, with a tin sword in his hand and joy in his heart until he is dropped. If he dies, he dies like a gentleman. ”

“ Whereat the Highlanders smote the Gurkhas as to the head, and told them not to vilify a British regiment, and the Gurkhas grinned cavernously, for the Highlanders were their elder brothers, and entitled to the privileges of kinship. The common soldier who touches a Gurkha is more than likely to have his head sliced open. ”

“ Every wise man's son doth know.
"I WONDER what will happen to me now," thought Black Sheep, when the semi-pagan rites peculiar to the burial of the dead in middle-class houses had been accomplished, and Aunty Rosa, awful in black crape, had returned to this life. "I don't think I've done anything bad that she knows of. I suppose I will soon. She will be very cross after Uncle Harry's dying, and Harry will be cross too. I'll keep in the nursery."
Unfortunately for Punch's plans, it was decided that he should be sent to a day-school which Harry attended. ”

“ Miss Biddums, it must be confessed, spoilt him as much as his nature admitted, in some sort of recompense for what she called "the hard ways of his Papa and Mamma". She, like her charge, knew nothing of the trouble between man and wife—the savage contempt for a woman's stupidity on the one side or the dull, rankling anger on the other. Miss Biddums had looked after many little children in her time, and served in many establishments. ”

“ She showed a readiness to weep afresh which steadied Wee Willie Winkie, who had been brought up to believe that tears were the depth of unmanliness. Still, when one is as great a sinner as Wee Willie Winkie, even a man may be permitted to break down. ”

“ In the event of defeat the Afghans had the rocky hills to fly to, where the flre from the guerilla tribes in aid would cover their retreat. In the event of victory these same tribes would rush down and lend their weight to the rout of the British.
The screw-guns were to shell the head of each Afghan rush that was made in close formation, and the Cavalry, held in reserve in the right valley, were to gently stimulate the break-up which would follow on the combined attack. The Brigadier sitting upon a rock overlooking the valley would watch the battle unrolled at his feet. ”

“ The fifty were Ghazis, half-maddened with drugs, and wholly mad with religious fanaticism. When they rushed the British fire ceased, and in the lull the order was given to close ranks and meet them with the bayonet.
Any one who knew the business could have told the Fore and Aft that the only way of dealing with a Ghazi rush is by volleys at long ranges; because a man who means to die, who desires to die, who will gain Heaven by dying, must in nine cases out of ten kill a man who has a lingering prejudice in favour of life if he can close with the latter. ”

“ A man dragged from his blankets half-awake and unfed is never in a pleasant frame of mind. Nor does his happiness increase when he watches the whites of the eyes of three hundred six-foot fiends upon whose beards the foam is lying, upon whose tongues is a roar of wrath, and in whose hands are three-foot knives.
The Fore and Aft heard the Gurkha bugles bringing that regiment forward at the double, while the neighing of the Highland pipes came from the left. ”

“ The child sat still for a little time and Miss Allardyce closed her eyes; the pain was nearly making her faint. She was roused by Wee Willie Winkie tying up the reins on his pony's neck and setting it free with a vicious cut of his whip that made it whicker. The little animal headed towards the cantonments.
"Oh Winkie! What are you doing?"
"Hssh!" said Wee Willie Winkie. "Vere's a man coming—one of ve bad Men. I must stay wiv you. My faver says a man must always look after a girl. ”

“ The grey man was his great hope and standby for many months after Mamma and left and he had forgotten to tell Judy to "bemember Mamma".
This lapse was excusable, because in the internal he had been introduced by Aunty Rosa to two very impressive things—an abstraction called God, the intimate friend and ally of Aunty Rosa, generally believed to live behind the kitchen-range because it was hot there—and a dirty brown book filled with unintelligible dots and marks. Punch was always anxious to oblige everybody. ”