A trusty troop and tried at many a trench.
That now the day was come, wherein our state
For aye should fall, whenceforth might men inquire
What Britain was, these wars thus near bewray’d.
Nor could the heavens no longer hide these harms,
But by prodigious signs portend our plagues.
For lo, ere both the camps encountering cop’d,
The skies and poles opposed themselves with storms:
Both east and west with tempests dark were dimm’d,
And showers of hail and rain outrageous pour’d.