Oh, Great Beaconsfield! the wise and the clever,
When will thy place in our nation be filled?
Britannia’s shrill answer is never, oh never,
My Beaconsfield’s dead, and my Gordon is killed!
Oh, blame not my foemen
Or a Brutus-like Roman,
Or Soudanese Arabs for Gordon’s sad doom;
But blame that vain Briton
Whose name is true written,
The slayer of Gordon, who fell at Khartoum.
The Earl of Beaconsfield.
I sing no song of superstition,
No dark deeds of an Inquisition,
No mad-brain’d theme of wild ambition,
For lo, their doom is sealed!
But I will use my best endeavour,
To praise the good, the wise, the clever,
Who will remember’d be for ever,
The Earl of Beaconsfield.
When England was without alliance,
He bid the Russians bold defiance,
On Austria had no reliance
In either flood or field;
He proudly sent to Hornby message,
The Dardanelles! go force the passage
In spite of Turkey, Bear, or Sausage,
The dauntless Beaconsfield!
At Berlin, he with admiration
Was gazed upon by every nation,
And, master of the situation,
Vow’d Britons ne’er would yield.
For I am here, you may depend on’t,
This Eastern brawl to make an end on’t,
To show both plaintiff and defendant
I’m Earl of Beaconsfield!
Britannia now doth weep and ponder,
Bereaved of him, her child of wonder,
No earthly power could break asunder
His love for England’s weal.
And now those locks once dark as raven
(For laurel leaves ne’er deck’d a craven)
Wear a laurel crown in Heaven,
Glorious Beaconsfield!
