Does he like to sit by the calm blue wave?

Or to sleep and snore in a dark green cave, or a Grott, The Ahkond of Swat?

Does he drink small beer from a silver jug?
Or a bowl or a glass? or a cup? or a mug?

or a Pot, The Ahkond of Swat?

Does he beat his wife with a gold-topped pipe,
When she lets the gooseberries grow too ripe,

or Rot, The Ahkond of Swat?

Does he wear a white tie when he dines with his friends, And tie it neat in a bow with ends,

or a Knot,

The Ahkond of Swat?

Does he like new cream, and hate mince-pies?
When he looks at the sun does he wink his eyes,

or Not,

The Ahkond of Swat?

Does he teach his subjects to roast and bake?

Does he sail about on an inland lake,

in a Yacht, The Ahkond of Swat?

Some one, or nobody knows I wot

Who or which or why or what

Is the Ahkond of Swati

Edward Lear.

THE AHKOOND OF SWAT

"The Ahkoond of Swat is dead."-London Papers of Jan. 22, 1878.

WHAT, what, what,

What's the news from Swat?

Sad news,

Bad news,

Comes by the cable led

The Ahkoond of Swat

Through the Indian Ocean's bed,

Through the Persian Gulf, the Red
Sea and the Med-

Iterranean-he's dead;

The Ahkoond is dead!

For the Ahkoond I mourn,

Who wouldn't?

He strove to disregard the message stern,

But he Ahkoodn't.

Dead, dead, dead:

(Sorrow, Swats!)

Swats wha hae wi' Ahkoond bled,

Swats whom he hath often led

Onward to a gory bed,

Or to victory,

As the case might be.

Sorrow, Swats!

Tears shed,

Shed tears like water.

Your great Ahkoond is dead!

That Swats the matter!

Mourn, city of Swat,

Your great Ahkoond is not,

But laid 'mid worms to rot.

His mortal part alone, his soul was caught
(Because he was a good Ahkoond)
Up to the bosom of Mahound.
Though earthly walls his frame surround
(Forever hallowed by the ground!)

And skeptics mock the lowly mound
And say "He's now of no Ahkoond!"
His soul is in the skies-

The azure skies that bend above his loved
Metropolis of Swat.

He sees with larger, other eyes,
Athwart all earthly mysteries-
He knows what's Swat.

711

Let Swat bury the great Ahkoond

With a noise of mourning and of lamentation!

Let Swat bury the great Ahkoond

With the noise of the mourning of the Swattish nation!
Fallen is at length

Its tower of strength;

Its sun is dimmed ere it had nooned;

Dead lies the great Ahkoond,

The great Ahkoond of Swat

Is not!

George Thomas Lanigan.

DIRGE OF THE MOOLLA OF KOTAL,

RIVAL OF THE AKHOOND OF SWAT

I

ALAS, unhappy land; ill-fated spot

Kotal-though where or what

On earth Kotal is, the bard has forgot;

Further than this indeed he knoweth not-
It borders upon Swat!

II

When sorrows come, they come not single spies,

But in battal

Ions: the gloom that lay on Swat now lies

Upon Kotal,

On sad Kotal whose people ululate

For their loved Moolla late.

Put away his little turban,
And his narghileh embrowned,
The lord of Kotal-rural urban-
'S gone unto his last Akhoond,
'S gone to meet his rival Swattan,
'S gone, indeed, but not forgotten.

Dirge of the Moolla of Kotal

713

III

His rival, but in what?

Wherein did the deceased Akhoond of Swat

Kotal's lamented Moolla late,

As it were, emulate?

Was it in the tented field

With crash of sword on shield,

While backward meaner champions reeled

And loud the tom-tom pealed?

Did they barter gash for scar
With the Persian scimetar
Or the Afghanistee tulwar,
While loud the tom-tom pealed—
While loud the tom-tom pealed,
And the jim-jam squealed,

And champions less well heeled

Their war-horses wheeled

And fled the presence of these mortal big bugs o' the field? Was Kotal's proud citadel

Bastioned, walled, and demi-luned,

Beaten down with shot and shell
By the guns of the Akhoond?

Or were wails despairing caught, as
The burghers pale of Swat

Cried in panic, "Moolla ad Portas?"

-Or what?

Or made each in the cabinet his mark

Kotalese Gortschakoff, Swattish Bismarck?

Did they explain and render hazier

The policies of Central Asia?

Did they with speeches from the throne,

Wars dynastic,

Entents cordiales,

Between Swat and Kotal;

Holy alliances,

And other appliances

Of statesmen with morals and consciences plastic

Come by much more than their own?

Made they mots, as "There to-day is

No more Himalayehs,"

Or, if you prefer it, "There to-day are
No more Himalaya?"

Or, said the Akhoond, "Sah,

L'Etat de Swat c'est moi?"

Khabu, did there come great fear
On thy Khabuldozed Ameer

Ali Shere?

Or did the Khan of far

Kashgar

Tremble at the menace hot
Of the Moolla of Kotal,
"I will extirpate thee, pal

Of my foe the Akhoond of Swat?"

Who knows

Of Moolla and Akhoond aught more than I did?
Namely, in life they rivals were, or foes,

And in their deaths not very much divided?

If any one knows it,

Let him disclose it!

George Thomas Lanigan.

THE BALLAD OF BOUILLABAISSE

A STREET there is in Paris famous,

For which no rhyme our language yields,
Rue Neuve des Petits Champs its name is-
The New Street of the Little Fields.
And here's an inn, not rich and splendid,
But still in comfortable case;

The which in youth I oft attended,
To eat a bowl of Bouillabaisse.

This Bouillabaisse a noble dish is-
A sort of soup, or broth, or brew,
Or hotchpotch of all sorts of fishes,

That Greenwich never could outdo:
Green herbs, red peppers, mussels, saffron,
Soles, onions, garlic, roach, and dace:

All these you eat at Terré's tavern
In that one dish of Bouillabaisse.