We fought with the strength of the moral right, and they, as their ships went down,
They only fought with the grit to fight and their armour to help ’em drown.
It mattered little what chance or hope, for ever their path was plain,
The Church was the Church, and the Pope the Pope—but the Spaniards fought for Spain.
If Providence struck for the honest thief at times in the battle’s din—
If ever it struck at the hypocrite—well, that’s where the Turks came in;
But this remains ere we leave the wise to argue it through in vain—
There’s something great in the wrong that dies as the Spaniards die for Spain.
The foes of Spain may be kin to us who are English heart and soul,
And proud of our national righteousness and proud of the lands we stole;
But we yet might pause while those brave men die and the death-drink pledge again—
For the sake of the past, if you’re doomed, say I, may your death be a grand one, Spain!
Then here’s to the bravest of Freedom’s foes who ever with death have stood—
For the sake of the courage to die on steel as their fathers died on wood;
And here’s a cheer for the flag unfurled in a hopeless cause again,
For the sake of the days when the Christian world was saved by the Dons of Spain.
THE BURSTING OF THE BOOM
The shipping-office clerks are ‘short,’ the manager is gruff—
‘They cannot make reductions,’ and ‘the fares are low enough.’
They ship us West with cattle, and we go like cattle too;
And fight like dogs three times a day for what we get to chew....
We’ll have the pick of empty bunks and lots of stretching room,
And go for next to nothing at the Bursting of the Boom.
So wait till the Boom bursts!—we’ll all get a show:
Then when the Boom bursts is our time to go.
We’ll meet ’em coming back in shoals, with looks of deepest gloom,
But we’re the sort that battle through at the Bursting of the Boom.
The captain’s easy-going when Fremantle comes in sight;
He can’t say when you’ll get ashore—‘perhaps to-morrow night;’
Your coins are few, the charges high; you must not linger here—
You’ll get your boxes from the hold ‘when she’s ’longside the pier.’ ...
The launch will foul the gangway, and the trembling bulwarks loom
Above a fleet of harbour craft—at the Bursting of the Boom.
So wait till the Boom bursts!—we’ll all get a show;
He’ll ‘take you for a bob, sir,’ and where you want to go.
He’ll ‘take the big portmanteau, sir, if he might so presume’—
You needn’t hump your luggage at the Bursting of the Boom.