The Last of the Light Brigade (1890) is a poem by Rudyard Kipling who narrates the plight of the veterans of the Light Brigade 36 years after the Charge. Our children's children are lisping to "honour the charge they made-"Īnd we leave to the streets and the workhouse the charge of the Light Brigade! O thirty million English that babble of England's might,īehold there are twenty heroes who lack their food to-night They healed the spavined cab-horse they housed the homeless dog Īnd they sent (you may call me a liar), when felon and beast were paid,Ī cheque, for enough to live on, to the last of the Light Brigade. They sent a cheque to the felon that sprang from an Irish bog Till the fatted souls of the English were scourged with the thing called Shame. The poor little army departed, limping and lean and forlorn.Īnd the heart of the Master-singer grew hot with "the scorn of scorn."Īnd he wrote for them wonderful verses that swept the land like flame, We think that someone has blundered, an' couldn't you tell 'em how? "No, thank you, we don't want food, sir but couldn't you take an' writeĪ sort of 'to be continued' and 'see next page' o' the fight? Here's all that isn't dead.Īn' it's all come true what you wrote, sir, regardin' the mouth of hell įor we're all of us nigh to the workhouse, an', we thought we'd call an' tell. The old Troop-Sergeant was spokesman, and "Beggin' your pardon," he said, They shambled into his presence, the last of the Light Brigade. With stooping of weary shoulders, in garments tattered and frayed,
They drilled on an empty stomach, the loose-knit files fell slack They strove to stand to attention, to straighten the toil-bowed back To look for the Master-singer who had crowned them all in his song Īnd, waiting his servant's order, by the garden gate they stayed,Ī desolate little cluster, the last of the Light Brigade. They went without bands or colours, a regiment ten-file strong, The things on Balaclava the kiddies at school recites." Keen were the Russian sabres, but want was keener than they Īnd an old Troop-Sergeant muttered, "Let us go to the man who writes They laid their heads together that were scarred and lined and grey They asked for a little money to keep the wolf from the door Īnd the thirty million English sent twenty pounds and four! That though they were dying of famine, they lived in deathless song. They felt that life was fleeting they knew not that art was long, They were only shiftless soldiers, the last of the Light Brigade. They had neither food nor money, they had neither service nor trade There were twenty broken troopers who lacked a bed for the night. There were thirty million English who talked of England's might, Most of the words are monosyllabic with the occasional disyllabic word allowing for an easy read with a focus on the message, rather than then aesthetics.
The simple, monosyllabic, end rhyme scheme lends musicality which ensures a smooth flow of the poem. Tennyson abstains from his tendency to ornamentation and like the Times reports he based the poem on, reports, poetically, on the event. Tennyson asks rhetorically when could the soldier’s glory fade and proclaims their valiance, and implores his readers to honour them and their efforts. The victors – the few who remained standing – emerged through the portal of Hell, to be immortalized by Tennyson’s words. The soldiers stop at nothing despite facing heavy casualties and canon-fire all around and they rip into the Cossack and Russian forces, chasing after them when they flee. He depicts the soldiers undaunted, gallant assault into enemy territory, the valley of Death (the valley between Fedyukhin Heights and the Causeway Heights) – a Biblical allusion to Psalms 23:4 – and refers to it as storming the mouth of Hell. Tennyson uses repetition to reinforce the seriousness of the task at hand as well as to grant continuity through the stanzas. These orders were miscommunicated and misinterpreted and it resulted in an unwarranted loss for British forces, who strode straight into unmatched, heavy gunfire of Russian troops. Tennyson captures the essence of the charge and the soldiers’ unquestioning acceptance of the orders. The Charge of the Light Brigade (1854) is a narrative poem by Alfred, Lord Tennyson which describes an event of the Crimean War: the Charge of the Light Brigade at the Battle of Balaclava.
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