KIPLING’S “RECESSIONAL”

Dominion, Volume 31, Issue 154, 26 March 1938, Page 8 (Supplement)

KIPLING’S “RECESSIONAL”

Rescued From Waste-paper Basket A sheet of thick blue foolscap, bearing five verses of poetry in small cramped handwriting in black ink in the centre, was recently on view in a glass case in the Thomas Grenville Library of the British Museum. It was Rudyard Kipling’s original manuscript of ids famous ‘‘Recessional.” The manuscript has recently been presented to the museum by Miss Elizabeth Gaskell Norton, a daughter of the American author, Charles Eliot Norton, who had it from her sister Sara.

It is, a curious story of how were rescued from a wa'stepaper basket into whicli Kipling had thrown them, those resonant stanzas ending: For heathen lieart that puts her trust In reeking tube and iron shard, All valiant dust that builds on dust, And guarding calls not Thee to guard, For frantic boast and . foolish word—

Thy mercy on Thy people, Lord! The piece was written soon after the Diamond Jubilee of Queen Victoria, June 22, 1897. On July 16, Kipling and his wife and a visitor, Miss Sara Norton, were in a room of the Kipling house at Rottingdean, Sussex. Kipling was sorting papers. Among ones he threw into the wastepaper basket was this manuscript, then headed “After.” Miss Norton rescued it and, seeing its nature, protested against its destruction. Whether it should be published was eventually left to Lady Burne-Jones (Kipling’s aunt),, who lived nearby. She supported Miss Norton, who herself suggested some rearrangement so as to repeat at the end of the second and fourth verses the words “Lord God of Hoste, be with u.s yet, lest we forget—lest we forget.” Kipling made these alterations with a pen borrowed from Miss Norton. He also changed the concluding words, “Thy mercy on Thy people,. Lord,” to “Thy mercy and forgiveness, Lord,” an amendment he subsequently changed back to its original form. ' A clean copy was made and was sent to “The Times,” in which journal it appeared on the following day under the heading “Recessional.” Kipling gave the original manuscript to Miss Norton with the changes she had suggested marked with the words “written with Sallie’s P&ffi R. K.” He also added as a footnote the words, “Done in Council at North End House July 16. Aunt Georgia, Sallie, Carrie and me.”

Referring to the “Recessional,” Kip ling says in his autobiography:

“It was more in the nature of a nuzzur-wattu (an averter of the evil eye) and—with the conservatism of the English—was used in choirs and places where they sing long after our navy and army alike had in the name of ‘peace’ been rendered innocuous. It was written just before I went off ju navy manoeuvres with my friend Captain Bagley. When I returned it seemed to me that -the time was ripe for its publication, so, after making one or two changes in it, I gave it to ‘The Times.’ I say ‘gave,’ because for this kind of work I did not take payment.”