Gunga Din

"Where I used to spend my time
A-servin’ of ’Er Majesty the Queen,
Of all them blackfaced crew
The finest man I knew
Was our regimental bhisti, Gunga Din..."

'Gunga Din' is a classic poem by Rudyard Kipling, first published in 1890. It is a rhyming narrative from the perspective of a British soldier in British India, which pays homage to the courage of an Indian water carrier, Gunga Din. Its eponymous character is a Bhisti, an Indian water-carrier, who saves the life of the the narrator after he is wounded in battle, only to later be shot and killed. In the final three lines, the soldier regrets the abuse that he dealt to Din and praises him as the better man. The poem was published within the Barrack-Room Ballads, as part of a set of martial poems. The poem is much remembered for its final "You're a better man than I am, Gunga Din".

(1865-1936) is often regarded as the unofficial Laureate of the British Empire. Yet his cutting verse and prose reveals a ferociously independent figure, at times violently opposed to the dominant political and literary tendencies of his age. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1907 "in consideration of the power of observation, originality of imagination, virility of ideas and remarkable talent for narration which characterize the creations of this world-famous author."