YULE
Amid the loud ebriety of War,With shouts of ‘La République’ and ‘La Gloire,’TheVengeur’screw, ’twas said, with flying flagAnd broadside blazing level with the waveWent down erect, defiant, to their graveBeneath the sea! ’Twas but a Frenchman’s brag,Yet Europe rang with it for many a year.Now we recount no fable; Europe, hear!And when they tell thee ‘England is a fen‘Corrupt, a kingdom tottering to decay,‘Her nerveless burghers lying an easy prey‘For the first comer,’ tell how the other dayA crew of half a thousand EnglishmenWent down into the deep in Simon’s Bay!Not with the cheer of battle in the throat,Or cannon-glare and din to stir their blood,But, roused from dreams of home to find their boatFast sinking, mustered on the deck they stood,Biding God’s pleasure and their chief’s command.Calm was the sea, but not less calm that bandClose ranged upon the poop, with bated breathBut flinching not though eye to eye with Death!Heroes! Who were those heroes? Veterans steeledTo face the King of Terrors ’mid the scaithOf many a hurricane and trenchèd field?Far other: weavers from the stocking-frame;Boys from the plough; cornets with beardless chin,But steeped in honour and in discipline!Weep, Britain, for the Cape whose ill-starred name,Long since divorced from Hope suggests but shame,Disaster, and thy captains held at bayBy naked hordes; but as thou weepest, thankHeaven for those undegenerate sons who sankAboard theBirkenheadin Simon’s Bay!Sir Henry Yule.
Amid the loud ebriety of War,With shouts of ‘La République’ and ‘La Gloire,’TheVengeur’screw, ’twas said, with flying flagAnd broadside blazing level with the waveWent down erect, defiant, to their graveBeneath the sea! ’Twas but a Frenchman’s brag,Yet Europe rang with it for many a year.Now we recount no fable; Europe, hear!And when they tell thee ‘England is a fen‘Corrupt, a kingdom tottering to decay,‘Her nerveless burghers lying an easy prey‘For the first comer,’ tell how the other dayA crew of half a thousand EnglishmenWent down into the deep in Simon’s Bay!Not with the cheer of battle in the throat,Or cannon-glare and din to stir their blood,But, roused from dreams of home to find their boatFast sinking, mustered on the deck they stood,Biding God’s pleasure and their chief’s command.Calm was the sea, but not less calm that bandClose ranged upon the poop, with bated breathBut flinching not though eye to eye with Death!Heroes! Who were those heroes? Veterans steeledTo face the King of Terrors ’mid the scaithOf many a hurricane and trenchèd field?Far other: weavers from the stocking-frame;Boys from the plough; cornets with beardless chin,But steeped in honour and in discipline!Weep, Britain, for the Cape whose ill-starred name,Long since divorced from Hope suggests but shame,Disaster, and thy captains held at bayBy naked hordes; but as thou weepest, thankHeaven for those undegenerate sons who sankAboard theBirkenheadin Simon’s Bay!Sir Henry Yule.
Amid the loud ebriety of War,With shouts of ‘La République’ and ‘La Gloire,’TheVengeur’screw, ’twas said, with flying flagAnd broadside blazing level with the waveWent down erect, defiant, to their graveBeneath the sea! ’Twas but a Frenchman’s brag,Yet Europe rang with it for many a year.Now we recount no fable; Europe, hear!And when they tell thee ‘England is a fen‘Corrupt, a kingdom tottering to decay,‘Her nerveless burghers lying an easy prey‘For the first comer,’ tell how the other dayA crew of half a thousand EnglishmenWent down into the deep in Simon’s Bay!
Not with the cheer of battle in the throat,Or cannon-glare and din to stir their blood,But, roused from dreams of home to find their boatFast sinking, mustered on the deck they stood,Biding God’s pleasure and their chief’s command.Calm was the sea, but not less calm that bandClose ranged upon the poop, with bated breathBut flinching not though eye to eye with Death!
Heroes! Who were those heroes? Veterans steeledTo face the King of Terrors ’mid the scaithOf many a hurricane and trenchèd field?Far other: weavers from the stocking-frame;Boys from the plough; cornets with beardless chin,But steeped in honour and in discipline!
Weep, Britain, for the Cape whose ill-starred name,Long since divorced from Hope suggests but shame,Disaster, and thy captains held at bayBy naked hordes; but as thou weepest, thankHeaven for those undegenerate sons who sankAboard theBirkenheadin Simon’s Bay!
Sir Henry Yule.