Recompense

I’d not have missed one single scrap of pain
That brought me to such friends, and them to me;
And precious is the smallest agony,
The greatest, willingly to bear again--
Cruel frost, night vigils, death so often ta’en
By Golgothas untold from Somme to Sea.
Duty’s a grey thing; Friendship valorously
Rides high above all Fortune without stain.

Their eyes were stars within the blackest night
Of Evil’s trial. Never mariner
Did trust so in the ever-fixéd star
As I in those. And so their laughter sounded--
Trumpets of Victory glittering in sunlight;
Though Hell’s power ringed them in, and night surrounded.