46 THE BOYS’ BROWNING.

Worth your Alexanders, Cesars, Marlboroughs, and
— what said Pitt ?—

Frederick the Fierce himself! Clive told me once”
—I want to say —

“ Which feat out of all those famous doings bore the
bell away

—In his own calm estimation, mark you, not the
mob’s rough guess —

Which stood foremost as evincing what Clive called
courageousness !

Come! What moment of the minute, what speck-
centre in the wide

Circle of the action saw your mortal fairly deified ?

(Let alone that filthy sleep-stuff, swallow bold this
wholesome Port!)

If a friend has leave to question, when were you
most brave, in short ?”

Up he arched his brows o’ the instant — formidably
Clive again.

«“ When was I most brave? I’d answer, were the in-
stance half as plain

As another instance that’s a brain-lodged crystal —
curse it !— here

Freezing when my memory touches — ugh ! — the time
I felt most fear.

Ugh! I cannot say for certain if I showed fear— any-
how, Bae,