The black log crashed above the white:
The little flames and lean,
Red as slaughter and blue as steel,
That whistled and fluttered from head to heel,
Leaped up anew, for they found their meal
On the heart of—the
Boondi Queen!
Abdhur Rahman, the Durani Chief,
of him is the story told.
His mercy fills the Khyber hills—
his grace is manifold;
He has taken toll of the North and the
South—
his glory reacheth far,
And they tell the tale of his charity
from Balkh to Kandahar.
Before the old Peshawur Gate, where Kurd and Kaffir
meet,
The Governor of Kabul dealt the Justice of the Street,
And that was strait as running noose and swift as
plunging knife,
Tho’ he who held the longer purse might hold
the longer life.
There was a hound of Hindustan had struck a Euzufzai,
Wherefore they spat upon his face and led him out
to die.
It chanced the King went forth that hour when throat
was bared to knife;
The Kaffir grovelled under-hoof and clamoured for
his life.
Then said the King: “Have hope, O friend!
Yea, Death disgraced is hard;
Much honour shall be thine”; and called the
Captain of the Guard,
Yar Khan, a bastard of the Blood, so city-babble saith,
And he was honoured of the King—the which
is salt to Death;
And he was son of Daoud Shah, the Reiver of the Plains,
And blood of old Durani Lords ran fire in his veins;
And ’twas to tame an Afghan pride nor Hell nor
Heaven could bind,
The King would make him butcher to a yelping cur of
Hind.
“Strike!” said the King. “King’s
blood art thou—his death shall be his pride!”
Then louder, that the crowd might catch: “Fear
not—his arms are tied!” Yar Khan
drew clear the Khyber knife, and struck, and sheathed
again. “O man, thy will is done,”
quoth he; “a King this dog hath slain.”
Abdhur Rahman, the Durani Chief,
to the North and the South
is sold.
The North and the South shall open their
mouth
to a Ghilzai flag unrolled,
When the big guns speak to the Khyber
peak,
and his dog-Heratis fly:
Ye have heard the song—How
long? How long?
Wolves of the Abazai!
That night before the watch was set, when all the
streets were clear,
The Governor of Kabul spoke: “My King,
hast thou no fear?
Thou knowest—thou hast heard,”—his
speech died at his master’s face.
And grimly said the Afghan King: “I rule
the Afghan race.
My path is mine—see thou to thine—tonight
upon thy bed
Think who there be in Kabul now that clamour for thy
head.”
That night when all the gates were shut to City and
to throne,
Within a little garden-house the King lay down alone.
Before the sinking of the moon, which is the Night
of Night,
Yar Khan came softly to the King to make his honour
white.
The children of the town had mocked beneath his horse’s
hoofs,
The harlots of the town had hailed him “butcher!”
from their roofs.
