Greed and fraud, unabashed, unawed, may strive to sting thee at heel in vain; Craft and fear and mistrust may leer and mourn and murmur and plead and plain: Thou art thou: and thy sunbright brow is hers that blasted the strength of Spain.
Mother, mother beloved, none other could claim in place of thee England's place: Earth bears none that beholds the sun so pure of record, so clothed with grace: Dear our mother, nor son nor brother is thine, as strong or as fair of face, How shalt thou be abased? or how shalt fear take hold of thy heart? of thine, England, maiden immortal, laden with charge of life and with hopes divine? Earth shall wither, when eyes turned hither behold not light in her darkness shine.
England, none that is born thy son, and lives by grace of thy glory, free, Lives and yearns not at heart and burns with hope to serve as he worships thee; None may sing thee: the sea-wind's wing beats down our songs as it hails the sea.
Swinburne.
[CXVIII]
A JACOBITE IN EXILE
The weary day rins down and dies, The weary night wears through: And never an hour is fair wi' flower, And never a flower wi' dew.
I would the day were night for me, I would the night were day: For then would I stand in my ain fair land, As now in dreams I may.
O lordly flow the Loire and Seine, And loud the dark Durance: But bonnier shine the braes of Tyne Than a' the fields of France; And the waves of Till that speak sae still Gleam goodlier where they glance.
O weel were they that fell fighting On dark Drumossie's day: They keep their hame ayont the faem And we die far away.
O sound they sleep, and saft, and deep, But night and day wake we; And ever between the sea banks green Sounds loud the sundering sea.