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.
I didn’t care to meet him, and I couldn’t well get down,
So I let the Waler have it, and we headed for the town.
The buggy was a new one and, praise Dykes, it stood the strain, Till the Waler jumped a bullock just above the City Drain; And the next that I remember was a hurricane of squeals, And the creature making toothpicks of my five-foot patent wheels.
He seemed to want the owner, so I fled, distraught with fear, To the Main Drain sewage outfall while he snorted in my ear— Reached the four-foot drain-head safely and, in darkness and despair, Felt the brute’s proboscis fingering my terror-stiffened hair,
Heard it trumpet on my shoulder—tried to crawl a little higher—
Found the Main Drain sewage-outfall blocked some eight feet up,
with mire;
And, for twenty reeking minutes, Sir, my very marrow froze,
While the trunk was feeling blindly for a purchase on my toes!
It missed me by a fraction, but my hair was turning grey Before they called the drivers up arid dragged the brute away. Then I sought the City Elders, and my words were very plain. They flushed that four-foot drain-head and—it never choked again.
You may hold with surface-drainage, and the sun-for-garbage cure, Till you’ve been a periwinkle shrinking coyly up a sewer. I believe in well-flushed culverts … This is why the death-rate’s small; And, if you don’t believe me, get shikarred yourself. That’s all.