in Injia's sunny clime

And, as Rudyard Kipling has wandered into my blog, I was thinking last week, "What do I know, by him?"
He wrote a lot of stuff: poems, stories, etc.
Nobel Prize.

Kipling works I could remember:
-- the poem "If"
-- the short story "Riki Tiki Tavi" and
-- "Gunga Din"

...and by "remember," I don't mean Memorized, but only some familiarity with...

"Gunga Din" is gritty.

begins:
You may talk o' gin and beer
When you're quartered safe out 'ere,
An' you're sent to penny-fights an' Aldershot it;
But when it comes to slaughter
You will do your work on water,
An' you'll lick the bloomin' boots of 'im that's got it.
Now in Injia's sunny clime,
Where I used to spend my time
A-servin' of 'Er Majesty the Queen,
...

[further on]
'E would dot an' carry one
till the longest day was done;
An' 'e didn't seem to know the use o' fear.
If we charged or broke or cut,
You could bet your bloomin' nut,
'E'd be waitin' fifty paces right flank rear.
With 'is mussick' on 'is back,
'E would skip with our attack...

When 'e went to tend the wounded under fire!

It was "Din! Din! Din!"
With the bullets kickin' dust-spots on the green
When the cartridges ran out,
You could hear the front-ranks shout,
"Hi! ammunition-mules an' Gunga Din!"

...
'E carried me away
To where a dooli lay,
An' a bullet come an' drilled the beggar clean.
'E put me safe inside,
An' just before 'e died,
"I 'ope you liked your drink" sez Gunga Din.
So I'll meet 'im later on
At the place where 'e is gone
Where it's always double drill and no canteen.
'E'll be squattin' on the coals
Givin' drink to poor damned souls,
An' I'll get a swig in hell from Gunga Din!
Yes, Din! Din! Din!

... [and at the end]:
By the livin' Gawd that made you,
You're a better man than I am, Gunga Din!
------------------------

(Does everyone in the World know that last line, even if they don't really know the poem? Everyone in the English-speaking world, anyway? I feel like they do, but -- I used to think all Americans voted in every presidential election, and it turned out it wasn't true. So now -- I don't know what I know.

Assume nothing.
Watch back.

-30-