Shome mishtake shurely? I'm sure the last lines of the last two verses have got changed round - they don't make sense as they stand, but swap them and it all comes clear. It's too late to wish he hadn't hit his pal last week, and getting the dead man back is just what a man can't do. I'd bet Kipling originally wrote it that way, and someone messed it up since. Great song, anyway.