Page:Departmental Ditties and Ballads and Barrack-Room Ballads, Kipling, 1899.djvu/52

MUNICIPAL

"Why is my District death-rate low?"
Said Binks of Hezabad.
"Wells, drains, and sewage-outfalls are
"My own peculiar fad.
"I learnt a lesson once. It ran
"Thus," quoth that most veracious man:—

It was an August evening, and in snowy garments clad,
I paid a round of visits in the lines of Hezabad;
When, presently, my Waler saw, and did not like at all
A Commissariat elephant careering down the Mall.

I couldn't see the driver, and across my mind it rushed

That that Commissariat elephant had suddenly gone musth.

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