RECRUITS ON THE ROAD TO OXFORD
THEY passed in dusty black defile
Along the burning champaign's edge
Where English oaks for many a mile
Dripped acorns o'er the berried hedge,
With valorous smiles on faces soiled
Out of the autumn's heat and light
These who on English earth had toiled
Came forth for English earth to fight,
Round their descending flank outspread
The country like a painted page—
God's truth, a man were lightly dead
For such a golden heritage!
But these, the surging centuries' wrack
Beyond all tides auspicious thrown,
Doomed with bowed head and threadbare back
To till the land they might not own,
Reft of the swallow's tranquil lease,
Reft of the scrap-fed robin's dole—
How have these reared in starving peace
This flaming valiancy of soul?...
O England, when with fluttered breath
You greet the victory they earn
And when with eyes that looked on death
The remnant of your sons return,
On your inviolate soil repent
And give the guerdon unbesought—
To these whose lives were freely lent
Some share of that for which they fought!