Part 7

Sweet eyes in England, I must flee Past where the waves’ last confines be, Ere your loved smile I cease to see, Sweet eyes in England, dear to me!

Dear home in England, safe and fast If but in thee my lot lie cast, The past shall seem a nothing past To thee, dear home, if won at last; Dear home in England, won at last!

_Arthur Hugh Clough._

LXXIV

THE RALLY

Say not the struggle naught availeth, The labour and the wounds are vain, The enemy faints not, nor faileth, And as things have been they remain.

If hopes were dupes, fears may be liars; It may be, in yon smoke conceal’d, Your comrades chase e’en now the fliers, And, but for you, possess the field.

For while the tired waves, vainly breaking, Seem here no painful inch to gain, Far back, through creeks and inlets making, Comes silent, flooding in, the main.

And not by eastern windows only, When daylight comes, comes in the light; In front the sun climbs slow, how slowly! But westward, look, the land is bright!

_Arthur Hugh Clough._

KINGSLEY

LXXV

ODE TO THE NORTH-EAST WIND

Welcome, wild North-Easter! Shame it is to see Odes to every zephyr; Ne’er a verse to thee. Welcome, black North-Easter! O’er the German foam; O’er the Danish moorlands, From thy frozen home. Tired we are of summer, Tired of gaudy glare, Showers soft and steaming, Hot and breathless air. Tired of listless dreaming, Through the lazy day: Jovial wind of winter, Turn us out to play! Sweep the golden reed-beds; Crisp the lazy dyke; Hunger into madness Every plunging pike. Fill the lake with wild-fowl; Fill the marsh with snipe; While on dreary moorlands Lonely curlew pipe. Through the black fir-forest Thunder harsh and dry, Shattering down the snow-flakes Off the curdled sky. Hark! the brave North-Easter! Breast-high lies the scent, On by holt and headland, Over heath and bent! Chime, ye dappled darlings, Through the sleet and snow. Who can override you? Let the horses go! Chime, ye dappled darlings, Down the roaring blast; You shall see a fox die Ere an hour be past. Go! and rest to-morrow, Hunting in your dreams, While our skates are ringing O’er the frozen streams. Let the luscious South-wind Breathe in lovers’ sighs, While the lazy gallants Bask in ladies’ eyes. What does he but soften Heart alike and pen? ’Tis the hard grey weather Breeds hard Englishmen. What’s the soft South-Wester? ’Tis the ladies’ breeze, Bringing home their true loves Out of all the seas: But the black North-Easter, Through the snow-storms hurled, Drives our English hearts of oak Seaward round the world. Come, as came our fathers, Heralded by thee, Conquering from the eastward, Lords by land and sea. Come; and strong within us Stir the Vikings’ blood; Bracing brain and sinew; Blow, thou wind of God!

_Charles Kingsley._

YULE

LXXVI

THE _BIRKENHEAD_

Amid the loud ebriety of War, With shouts of ‘La République’ and ‘La Gloire,’ The _Vengeur’s_ crew, ’twas said, with flying flag And broadside blazing level with the wave Went down erect, defiant, to their grave Beneath 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 day A crew of half a thousand Englishmen Went 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 boat Fast 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 band Close ranged upon the poop, with bated breath But flinching not though eye to eye with Death!

Heroes! Who were those heroes? Veterans steeled To face the King of Terrors ’mid the scaith Of 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 bay By naked hordes; but as thou weepest, thank Heaven for those undegenerate sons who sank Aboard the _Birkenhead_ in Simon’s Bay!

_Sir Henry Yule._

CORY

LXXVII

SCHOOL FENCIBLES

We come in arms, we stand ten score, Embattled on the Castle green; We grasp our firelocks tight, for war Is threatening, and we see our Queen. And ‘Will the churls last out till we Have duly hardened bones and thews For scouring leagues of swamp and sea Of braggart mobs and corsair crews?’ We ask; we fear not scoff or smile At meek attire of blue and grey, For the proud wrath that thrills our isle Gives faith and force to this array. So great a charm is England’s right, That hearts enlarged together flow, And each man rises up a knight To work the evil-thinker’s woe. And, girt with ancient truth and grace, We do our service and our suit, And each can be, whate’er his race, A Chandos or a Montacute. Thou, Mistress, whom we serve to-day, Bless the real swords that we shall wield, Repeat the call we now obey In sunset lands, on some fair field. Thy flag shall make some Huron rock As dear to us as Windsor’s keep, And arms thy Thames hath nerved shall mock The surgings of th’ Ontarian deep. The stately music of thy Guards, Which times our march beneath thy ken, Shall sound, with spells of sacred bards, From heart to heart, when we are men. And when we bleed on alien earth, We’ll call to mind how cheers of ours Proclaimed a loud uncourtly mirth Amongst thy glowing orange bowers. And if for England’s sake we fall, So be it, so thy cross be won, Fixed by kind hands on silvered pall, And worn in death, for duty done. Ah! thus we fondle Death, the soldier’s mate, Blending his image with the hopes of youth To hallow all; meanwhile the hidden fate Chills not our fancies with the iron truth. Death from afar we call, and Death is here, To choose out him who wears the loftiest mien; And Grief, the cruel lord who knows no peer, Breaks through the shield of love to pierce our Queen.

_William Cory._

HOW

LXXVIII

A NATIONAL HYMN

To Thee, our God, we fly For mercy and for grace; O hear our lowly cry, And hide not Thou Thy face! O Lord, stretch forth Thy mighty hand, And guard and bless our Fatherland!

Arise, O Lord of Hosts! Be jealous for Thy Name, And drive from out our coasts The sins that put to shame! O Lord, stretch forth Thy mighty hand, And guard and bless our Fatherland!

The powers ordained by Thee With heavenly wisdom bless, May they Thy servants be, And rule in righteousness! O Lord, stretch forth Thy mighty hand, And guard and bless our Fatherland!

Though vile and worthless, still, Thy people, Lord, are we; And for our God we will None other have but Thee. O Lord, stretch forth Thy mighty hand, And guard and bless our Fatherland!

_William Walsham How._

INGRAM

LXXIX

A NATION’S WEALTH

O England, thou hast many a precious dower; But of all treasures it is thine to claim, Prize most the memory of each sainted name, That in thy realm, in field or hall or bower Hath wrought high deeds or utter’d words of power-- Unselfish warrior, without fear or blame-- Statesman, with sleepless watch and steadfast aim Holding his country’s helm in perilous hour-- Poet, whose heart is with us to this day Embalm’d in song--or Priest, who by the ark Of faith stood firm in troublous times and dark. Call them not dead, my England! such as they Not _were_ but _are_; within us each survives, And lives an endless life in others’ lives.

_John Kells Ingram._

LUSHINGTON

LXXX

THE MUSTER OF THE GUARDS

(1854)

Lying here awake, I hear the watchman’s warning-- ‘Past four o’clock’--on this February morning; Hark! what is that?--there swells a joyous shiver Borne down the wind o’er the voices of the river; O’er the lordly waters flowing, ’tis the martial trumpets blowing, ’Tis the Grenadier Guards a-going--marching to the war.

Yes--there they go, through the February morning, To where the engine whistles its shrill and solemn warning; And the dull hoarse roar of the multitudes that cheer Falls ever and anon with a faint crash on the ear; ’Mid the tears of wives and mothers, and the prayers of many others, And the cheers of their brothers, they are marching to the war.

Cheer, boys, cheer! till you crack a thousand throats; Cheer, boys, cheer! to the merry music’s notes; Let the girls they leave behind them wave handkerchiefs and scarfs, Let the hearty farewell ring through the echoing streets and wharfs; Come--volley out your holloas--come, cheer the gallant fellows, The gallant and good fellows, marching to the war.

Bridge of Waterloo!--let the span of each proud arch Spring to the feet of the soldiers as they march; For the last time they went forth, your glorious name was borne Where the bullets rained like hail among the summer corn: Ah! we’ll not forget too soon the great Eighteenth of June, While the British Grenadier’s tune strikes up gaily for the war.

Bridge of Waterloo!--accept the happy omen, For the staunchest friends are wrought out of the bravest foemen: Guards of Waterloo!--the troops whose brunt you bore Shall stand at your right hand upon the Danube’s shore; And Trafalgar’s flags shall ride on the tall masts, side by side, O’er the Black Sea and the Baltic, to sweep the waves of war.

Die, die away, o’er the bridge and up the street, Shiver of their music, echo of their feet: Dawn upon the darkness, chilly day and pale; Steady rolling engine, flash along the rail; For the good ship waits in port, with her tackle trim and taut, And her ready funnels snort, till she bear them to the war.

Far, far away, they are bound across the billow, Where the Russian sleeps uneasy on his last plundered pillow; Where the Cross is stained with fraud by the giant evil-doer, And the pale Crescent shines with a steady light and pure; And their coats will be dim with dust, and their bayonets brown with rust, Ere they conquer, as we trust, in the mighty game of war.

Peace, peace, peace, with the vain and silly song, That we do no sin ourselves, if we wink at others’ wrong; That to turn the second cheek is _the_ lesson of the Cross, To be proved by calculation of the profit and the loss: Go home, you idle teachers! you miserable creatures! The cannons are God’s preachers, when the time is ripe for war.

Peace is no peace, if it lets the ill grow stronger, Merely cheating destiny a very little longer; War, with its agonies, its horrors, and its crimes; Is cheaper if discounted and taken up betimes: When the weeds of wrath are rank, you must plough the poisoned bank, Sow and reap the crop of Peace with the implements of war.

God, defend the right, and those that dare to claim it! God, cleanse the earth from the many wrongs that shame it! Give peace in our time, but not the peace of trembling, Won by true strength, not cowardly dissembling; Let us see in pride returning, as we send them forth in yearning, Our Grenadier Guards from earning the trophies of the war.

_Sir Franklin Lushington._

PALGRAVE

LXXXI

ALFRED THE GREAT

The Isle of Roses in her Lindian shrine, Athena’s dwelling, gleam’d with golden song Of Pindar, set in gold the walls along, Blazoning the praise of Héraclés divine. --O Poets, who for us have wrought the mine Of old Romance, illusive pearl and gold, Its star-fair maids, knights of heroic mould, Ye lend the rays that on their features shine,

Ideal strength and beauty:--But O thou Fair Truth!--to thee with deeper faith we bow; Knowing thy genuine heroes bring with them Their more than poetry. From these we learn What men can be. By their own light they burn As in far heavens the Pleiad diadem.

The fair-hair’d boy is at his mother’s knee, A many-colour’d page before them spread, Gay summer harvest-field of gold and red, With lines and staves of ancient minstrelsy. But through her eyes alone the child can see, From her sweet lips partake the words of song, And looks as one who feels a hidden wrong, Or gazes on some feat of gramarye.

‘When thou canst use it, thine the book!’ she cried: He blush’d, and clasp’d it to his breast with pride:-- ‘Unkingly task!’ his comrades cry; in vain; All work ennobles nobleness, all art, He sees; head governs hand; and in his heart All knowledge for his province he has ta’en.

Few the bright days, and brief the fruitful rest, As summer-clouds that o’er the valley flit:-- To other tasks his genius he must fit; The Dane is in the land, uneasy guest!--O sacred Athelney, from pagan quest Secure, sole haven for the faithful boy Waiting God’s issue with heroic joy And unrelaxing purpose in the breast!

The Dragon and the Raven, inch by inch, For England fight; nor Dane nor Saxon flinch; Then Alfred strikes his blow; the realm is free:-- He, changing at the font his foe to friend, Yields for the time, to gain the far-off end, By moderation doubling victory.

O much-vex’d life, for us too short, too dear! The laggard body lame behind the soul; Pain, that ne’er marr’d the mind’s serene control; Breathing on earth heaven’s æther atmosphere, God with thee, and the love that casts out fear! O soul in life’s salt ocean guarding sure The freshness of youth’s fountain sweet and pure, And to all natural impulse crystal-clear:--

To service or command, to low and high Equal at once in magnanimity, The Great by right divine thou only art! Fair star, that crowns the front of England’s morn, Royal with Nature’s royalty inborn, And English to the very heart of heart!

_Francis Turner Palgrave._

LXXXII

TRAFALGAR

_Heard ye the thunder of battle Low in the South and afar? Saw ye the flash of the death-cloud Crimson o’er Trafalgar? Such another day never England will look on again, When the battle fought was the hottest, And the hero of heroes was slain!_

For the fleet of France and the force of Spain were gather’d for fight, A greater than Philip their lord, a new Armada in might:-- And the sails were aloft once more in the deep Gaditanian bay, Where _Redoubtable_ and _Bucentaure_ and great _Trinidada_ lay;

Eager-reluctant to close; for across the bloodshed to be Two navies beheld one prize in its glory,--the throne of the sea! Which were bravest, who should tell? for both were gallant and true; But the greatest seaman was ours, of all that sail’d o’er the blue.

From Cadiz the enemy sallied: they knew not Nelson was there; His name a navy to us, but to them a flag of despair; ’Twixt Algeziras and Aquamonte he guarded the coast, Till he bore from Tavira south; and they now must fight or be lost;-- Vainly they steered for the Rock and the mid-land sheltering sea, For he headed the Admirals round, constraining them under his lee, Villeneuve of France, and Gravina of Spain; so they shifted their ground, They could choose,--they were more than we;--and they faced at Trafalgar round; Rampart-like ranged in line, a sea-fortress angrily towered! In the midst, four-storied with guns, the dark _Trinidada_ lower’d.

So with those--But, meanwhile, as against some dyke that men massively rear, From on high the torrent surges, to drive through the dyke as a spear, Eagle-eyed e’en in his blindness, our chief sets his double array, Making the fleet two spears, to thrust at the foe any way, ... ‘Anyhow!--without orders, each captain his Frenchman may grapple perforce; Collingwood first’ (yet the _Victory_ ne’er a whit slacken’d her course) ‘Signal for action! Farewell! we shall win, but we meet not again!’ --Then a low thunder of readiness ran from the decks o’er the main, And on,--as the message from masthead to masthead flew out like a flame, ENGLAND EXPECTS EVERY MAN WILL DO HIS DUTY,--they came.

--Silent they come:--While the thirty black forts of the foeman’s array Clothe them in billowy snow, tier speaking o’er tier as they lay; Flashes that thrust and drew in, as swords when the battle is rife;-- But ours stood frowningly smiling, and ready for death as for life. --O in that interval grim, ere the furies of slaughter embrace, Thrills o’er each man some far echo of England; some glance of some face! --Faces gazing seaward through tears from the ocean-girt shore; Faces that ne’er can be gazed on again till the death pang is o’er.... Lone in his cabin the Admiral kneeling, and all his great heart As a child’s to the mother, goes forth to the loved one, who bade him depart ... O not for death, but glory! her smile would welcome him home! --Louder and thicker the thunderbolts fall:--and silent they come.

As when beyond Dongola the lion, whom hunters attack, Plagued by their darts from afar, leaps in, dividing them back; So between Spaniard and Frenchman the _Victory_ wedged with a shout, Gun against gun; a cloud from her decks and lightning went out; Iron hailing of pitiless death from the sulphury smoke; Voices hoarse and parch’d, and blood from invisible stroke. Each man stood to his work, though his mates fell smitten around, As an oak of the wood, while his fellow, flame-shatter’d, besplinters the ground:-- Gluttons of danger for England, but sparing the foe as he lay; For the spirit of Nelson was on them, and each was Nelson that day.

‘She has struck!’--he shouted--‘She burns, the _Redoubtable_! Save whom we can; ‘Silence our guns:’--for in him the woman was great in the man, In that heroic heart each drop girl-gentle and pure, Dying by those he spared;--and now Death’s triumph was sure! From the deck the smoke-wreath clear’d, and the foe set his rifle in rest, Dastardly aiming, where Nelson stood forth, with the stars on his breast,-- ‘In honour I gained them, in honour I die with them!’ ... Then, in his place, Fell ... ‘Hardy! ’tis over; but let them not know:’ and he cover’d his face. Silent the whole fleet’s darling they bore to the twilight below: And above the war-thunder came shouting, as foe struck his flag after foe.

To his heart death rose: and for Hardy, the faithful, he cried in his pain,-- ‘How goes the day with us, Hardy?’... ‘’Tis ours’:-- Then he knew, not in vain Not in vain for his comrades and England he bled: how he left her secure, Queen of her own blue seas, while his name and example endure. O, like a lover he loved her! for her as water he pours Life-blood and life and love, lavish’d all for her sake, and for ours! --‘Kiss me, Hardy!--Thank God!--I have done my duty!’--and then Fled that heroic soul, and left not his like among men.

_Hear ye the heart of a Nation Groan, for her saviour is gone; Gallant and true and tender, Child and chieftain in one? Such another day never England will weep for again, When the triumph darkened the triumph, And the hero of heroes was slain._

_Francis Turner Palgrave._

DOBELL

LXXXIII

A SEA ADVENTURE

‘How many?’ said our good captain, ‘Twenty sail and more!’ We were homeward bound, Scudding in a gale with our jib towards the Nore;-- Right athwart our tack, The foe came thick and black, Like hell-birds and foul weather--you might count them by the score!

The _Betsy Jane_ did slack To see the game in view; They knew the Union Jack, And the tyrant’s flag we knew. Our captain shouted, ‘Clear the decks!’ and the bo’sun’s whistle blew.

Then our gallant captain, With his hand he seized the wheel, And pointed with his stump to the middle of the foe,-- ‘Hurrah, lads, in we go!’ (You should hear the British cheer, Fore and aft!)

‘There are twenty sail,’ sang he, ‘But little _Betsy Jane_ bobs to nothing on the sea!’ (You should hear the British cheer, Fore and aft!)

‘See yon ugly craft With the pennon at her main! Hurrah, my merry boys, There goes the _Betsy Jane_!’ (You should hear the British cheer, Fore and aft!)

The foe, he beats to quarters, and the Russian bugles sound; And the little _Betsy Jane_ she leaps upon the sea. ‘Port and starboard!’ cried our captain; ‘Pay it in, my hearts!’ sang he.

‘We’re old England’s sons, And we’ll fight for her to-day!’ (You should hear the British cheer, Fore and aft!) ‘Fire away!’

In she runs, And her guns Thunder round.

_Sydney Dobell._

ALEXANDER

LXXXIV

WAR

They say that ‘war is hell,’ the ‘great accursed,’ The sin impossible to be forgiven; Yet I can look beyond it at its worst, And still find blue in Heaven.

And as I note how nobly natures form Under the war’s red rain, I deem it true That He who made the earthquake and the storm Perchance makes battles too!

The life He loves is not the life of span Abbreviated by each passing breath, It is the true humanity of man Victorious over death,

The long expectance of the upward gaze, Sense ineradicable of things afar, Fair hope of finding after many days The bright and morning star.

Methinks I see how spirits may be tried, Transfigured into beauty on war’s verge, Like flowers, whose tremulous grace is learnt beside The trampling of the surge.

And now, not only Englishmen at need Have won a fiery and unequal fray,-- No infantry has ever done such deed Since Albuera’s day!

Those who live on amid our homes to dwell Have grasped the higher lessons that endure,-- The gallant Private learns to practise well His heroism obscure.

His heart beats high as one for whom is made A mighty music solemnly, what time The oratorio of the cannonade Rolls through the hills sublime.

Yet his the dangerous posts that few can mark, The crimson death, the dread unerring aim, The fatal ball that whizzes through the dark, The just-recorded name--

The faithful following of the flag all day, he duty done that brings no nation’s thanks, The _Ama Nesciri_[1] of some grim and grey À Kempis of the ranks.

These are the things our commonweal to guard, The patient strength that is too proud to press, The duty done for duty, not reward, The lofty littleness.

And they of greater state who never turned, Taking their path of duty higher and higher, What do we deem that they, too, may have learned In that baptismal fire?

Not that the only end beneath the sun Is to make every sea a trading lake, And all our splendid English history one Voluminous mistake.

They who marched up the bluffs last stormy week-- Some of them, ere they reached the mountain’s crown, The wind of battle breathing on their cheek Suddenly laid them down.