The Pipes at Lucknow

Pipes of the misty moorlands,Voice of the glens and hills;The droning of the torrents,The treble of the rills!Not the braes of bloom and heather,5Nor the mountains dark with rain,Nor maiden bower, nor border tower,Have heard your sweetest strain!

Dear to the Lowland reaper,And plaided mountaineer, -10To the cottage and the castleThe Scottish pipes are dear; -Sweet sounds the ancient pibrochO'er mountain, loch, and glade;But the sweetest of all music15The pipes at Lucknow played.

Day by day the Indian tigerLouder yelled, and nearer crept;Round and round the jungle-serpentNear and nearer circles swept.20'Pray for rescue, wives and mothers, -Pray to-day!' the soldier said;'To-morrow, death's between usAnd the wrong and shame we dread.'

Oh, they listened, looked, and waited,25Till their hope became despair;And the sobs of low bewailingFilled the pauses of their prayer.Then up spake a Scottish maiden.With her ear unto the ground:30'Dinna ye hear it? - dinna ye hear it?The pipes o' Havelock sound!'

Hushed the wounded man his groaning;Hushed the wife her little ones;Alone they heard the drum-roll35And the roar of Sepoy guns.But to sounds of home and childhoodThe Highland ear was true; -As her mother's cradle-crooningThe mountain pipes she knew.40

Like the march of soundless musicThrough the vision of the seer,More of feeling than of hearing,Of the heart than of the ear,She knew the droning pibroch,45She knew the Campbell's call:'Hark! hear ye no MacGregor's,The grandest o' them all!'

Oh, they listened, dumb and breathless,And they caught the sound at last;50Faint and far beyond the GoomteeRose and fell the piper's blast!Then a burst of wild thanksgivingMingled woman's voice and man's;'God be praised! - the march of Havelock!55The piping of the clans!'

Louder, nearer, fierce as vengeance,Sharp and shrill as swords at strife,Came the wild MacGregor's clan-call,Stinging all the air to life.60But when the far-off dust-cloudTo plaided legions grew,Full tenderly and blithesomelyThe pipes of rescue blew!

Round the silver domes of Lucknow.65Moslem mosque and Pagan shrine,Breathed the air to Britons dearest,The air of Auld Lang Syne.O'er the cruel roll of war-drumsRose that sweet and homelike strain;70And the tartan clove the turban,As the Goomtee cleaves the plain.

Dear to the corn-land reaperAnd plaided mountaineer, -To the cottage and the castle75The piper's song is dear.Sweet sounds the Gaelic pibrochO'er mountain, glen, and glade;But the sweetest of all musicThe pipes at Lucknow played!80