Sons of the giant Ocean isle
In sport our friendly foes for long,
Well England loves you, and we smile
When you outmatch us many a while,
So fleet you are, so keen and strong.
You, like that fairy people set
Of old in their enchanted sea
Far off from men, might well forget
An elder nation’s toil and fret,
Might heed not aught but game and glee.
But what your fathers were you are
In lands the fathers never knew,
’Neath skies of alien sign and star
You rally to the English war;
Your hearts are English, kind and true.
And now, when first on England falls
The shadow of a darkening fate,
You hear the Mother ere she calls,
You leave your ocean-girdled walls,
And face her foemen in the gate.
COLONEL BURNABY.
συ δ’ εν στροφάλιγγι κονίης
κεισο μέγας μεγαλωστι, λελασμένος ιπποσυνάων
Thou that on every field of earth and sky
Didst hunt for Death, who seemed to flee and fear,
How great and greatly fallen dost thou lie
Slain in the Desert by some wandering spear:
‘Not here, alas!’ may England say, ‘not here
Nor in this quarrel was it meet to die,
But in that dreadful battle drawing nigh
To thunder through the Afghan passes sheer:
Like Aias by the ships shouldst thou have stood,
And in some glen have stayed the stream of flight,
The bulwark of thy people and their shield,
When Indus or when Helmund ran with blood,
Till back into the Northland and the Night
The smitten Eagles scattered from the field.’
MELVILLE AND COGHILL.
(THE PLACE OF THE LITTLE HAND.)