  Teach us delight in simple things,
And mirth that has no bitter springs;
Forgiveness free of evil done,
And love of all men neath' the sun!
Rudyard Kipling.
Buddha at Kamakura.
Kipling was the poet of The British Empire
- the poet of the common British soldier. I can remember my father used to recite 'The Green Eye of the Little Yellow God' by Kipling - at least I always thought it
was by him for it is so Kiplingesque, but
in later life I found it was by J. Milton
Hayes. My Dad knew the poem off by heart
all the way through, and it was obviously
his "party piece."
The poem was about a soldier in the
British Army in India known among the ranks
as 'Mad Karoo.’ [from the Boer War.] The Colonel’s daughter loved him etc. He stole an emerald which formed the eye
of a Hindu idol, and was cursed etc. I eventually found a copy on the internet
and here it is:
The Green Eye of the Yellow God
by
J. Milton Hayes.
There's a one-eyed yellow idol to the north
of Khatmandu,
There's a little marble cross below the town;
There's a broken-hearted woman tends the
grave of Mad Carew,
And the Yellow God forever gazes down.
He was known as Mad Carew by the subs of
Khatmandu,
He was hotter than they felt inclined to
tell;
But for all his foolish pranks, he was worshipped
in the ranks,
And the Colonel's daughter smiled on him
as well.
He had loved her all along, with a passion
of the strong,
The fact that she loved him was plain to
all.
She was nearly twenty-one and arrangements
had begun
To celebrate her birthday with a ball.
He wrote to ask what present she would like
from Mad Carew;
They met next day as he dismissed a squad;
And jestingly she told him then that nothing
else would do
But the green eye of the little Yellow God.
On the night before the dance, Mad Carew
seemed in a trance,
And they chaffed him as they puffed at their
cigars;
But for once he failed to smile, and he sat
alone awhile,
Then went out into the night beneath the
stars.
He returned before the dawn, with his shirt
and tunic torn,
And a gash across his temples dripping red;
He was patched up right away, and he slept
through all the day,
And the Colonel's daughter watched beside
his bed.
He woke at last and asked if they could send
his tunic through;
She brought it, and he thanked her with a
nod;
He bade her search the pocket, saying,' That's
from Mad Carew',
And she found the little green eye of the
god.
She upbraided poor Carew in the way that
women do,
Though both her eyes were strangely hot and
wet;
But she wouldn't take the stone, and Mad
Carew was left alone
With the jewel that he'd chanced his life
to get.
When the ball was at its height, on that
still and tropic night,
She thought of him and hastened to his room;
As she crossed the barrack square she could
hear the dreamy air
Of a waltz tune softly stealing through the
gloom.
His door was open wide, with silver moonlight
shining through,
The place was wet and slippery where she
trod;
An ugly knife lay buried in the heart of
Mad Carew,
'Twas the 'Vengeance of the Little Yellow
God'.
There's a one-eyed yellow idol to the north
of Khatmandu,
There's a little marble cross below the town;
There's a broken-hearted woman tends the
grave of Mad Carew,
And the Yellow God forever gazes down.
By J. Milton Hayes
|
Evans Experientialism 
