The Islanders.

Marlborough Express, Volume XXXVI, Issue 39, 15 February 1902, Page 6 (Supplement)

The Islanders.

(By RuDYAUD Kipling.)

We publish below the whole of the magnificent and stirring appeal which Mr Kipling has made to his countrymen in a recent issue of The Times.

Fenced by your careful fathers, ringed by your leaden seas, Long did ye wake in quiet, and long lie down at ease; Till ye said of Strife:—" What is it ?" Of the Sword:—" It is far from our ken" ;

Till ye made a sport of your shrunken hosts and a toy of your armed men. Ye stopped your ears to the warning— ye would neither look nor heed — Ye sot your leisure before their toil, and your lusts above their need; Because of your witless learning and your beasts of warren and chase, Ye grudged your sons for their service and your fields for their campingplace. Ye forced them glean in the highways the straw for the bricks they brought; Ye forced them follow in byeways the craft that ye never taught. Yehindered and hampered and crippled; ye thrust out of sight and away Those that would serve you for honor and those that served you for pay. Then were the Judgments loosened ; then was your shame revealed. At the hands of a little people, few but apt in the field Yet ye were saved by a remnant (and p\\v land's long-auffering Star),

When your strong men cheered in their millions while your striplings went to the war.

Sons of the sheltered cifcy—-unmade, unhandled, unmeet— Ye pushed them raw to the battle as ye picked them raw from the street. And what did ye look they should compass? War-craft learned in a breath ?

Knowledge unto occasion at the first far view of Death ? So ! And ye train your horses and the dogs ye feed and prize. How are tho beasts more worthy than the souls you sacrifice ? But ye said:—" Their valour shall show them" ; but ye said :—" The i end is close" ; And ye sent them comfits and pictures to help them harry your foes. And ye vaunted your fathomless power and ye flaunted your iron pride Ere~ye fawned on the Younger Nations for the men who could shoot and ride! Then ye returned to your triukets; then ye contented your souls With the flannelled fools at the wicket or the muddied oafs at the goals. Given to strong delusion, wholly believing a lie, Ye saw that the land lay defenceless and ye let the months go by ; Waiting some easy wonder; hoping some saving sign— Idle —openly idle—in the lee of the forespent Line. Idle—except for your boasting, and what is your boasting worth If ye grudge a year of service to the lordliest life on Earth ? Ancient, effortless, ordered, cycle on cycle set — Life so long untroubled that ye who inherit forget It was not made •with the mountains ; it is not one with the deep. Men, not Gods, devised it. Men, not Gods, must keep. Men, not children, servants, or kinsfolk called from afar, But each mm born in the island broke to the matter of war. Soberly, and by custom, taken and . trained for the same ; Each man born in the island entered at youth to the game — As it were almost cricket—as it were even your play — Weighed and pondered and worshipped and practised day on day. So ye shall bide sure guarded when the restless lightnings wake In the womb of the blotting war-cloud and the pallid nations quake. So, at the haggard trumpets, instant your soul shall leap Forthright, full-harnessed, accepting— alert from the wells of sleep. So at the threat ye shall summon—so at the need ye shall send Men, not children or servants, tempered and taught to the end. Cleansed of servile panic, slow to dread or despise. Humble bee tuse of knowledge ; mighty by sacrifice.

Bufc ye say:— "It will mar our comfort." Ye say:-—" It will 'minish our trade."

Do ye wait for the spattered shrapnel ere ye learn how a gun is laid ? For the low red glare to southward when the raided coast-towns burn ? (Light ye shall have on that lesson, but little time to learn.) Will ye pitch some white pavilion ; and lustily even the odds With nets and hoops and mallets, with racquets and bats and rods ? Will the rabbit war with your foeman — the red-deer horn them for hire ? The kept cock pheasant keep you? He is master of many a shire. Arid, aloof, incurious, unthinking, unthanking, gelt— Will ye loose your schools to flout them till the browbeat columns melt ? Will ye pray them or preach them or print them or ballot them back from your shoros ? Will your workmen issue a mandate to bid them strike no more ? Will ye rise and dethrone your rulers ? (Because ye were idle both. Pride by inso ence chastened? Indolence purged by sloth ?) No doubt but ye are the people ; who shall make you afraid ? Also your gods are many: no doubt but your gods shall aid. Idols of greasy altars built for the spirit's case; Proud little brazen Baals and talking fetishes;

Teraphs of sept and party and wise wood-pavement Gods — These shall come down to the battle and snatch you from under the rods ?

From the gusty flickering gun-roll with viewless salvoes rent. And the pitted hail of the bullets that tell not whence they are sent. When ye are ringed as with iron, when ye are scourged as with whips, When the meat is yet in your belly and the boast is yet on your lips ; When ye go forth at morning and the noon beholds you broke— Ere ye lie down at even, your remnant under the yoke.

No doubt but ye are the people—absolute, strong, and wise; Whatever your heart has desired ye have not withheld from your eyes. On your own heads, in your own hands, the sin and the saving lies!