human
Can you write a poem for me in the style of Unknown?
assistant
Sure, here's a poem in the style of Unknown:
  They watch us leaving harbour for the greatest game of all,
And wonder if we're coming back across the greedy sea;
They never know the fighting thrill or high adventure's call--
I rather think the women folk are better men than we.
But I suspect they say of us as out to sea we go,
In all our panoply of pride from Orkney to the Nore:
"It keeps them quiet, we suppose--they like the work, we know--
And soon perhaps they'll tire and play some safer game than War."
He went to sea on the long patrol,
Away to the East from the Corton Shoal,
But now he's overdue.
He signalled me as he bore away
(A flickering lamp through leaping spray,
And darkness then till judgment day),
"So long! Good luck to you!"
He's waiting out on the long patrol,
Till the names are called at the muster-roll
Of seamen overdue.
Far above him, in wind and rain,
Another is on patrol again--
The gap is closed in the Naval Chain
Where all the links are new.
Over his head the seas are white,
And the wind is blowing a gale to-night,
As if the Storm-King knew,
And roared a ballad of sleet and snow
To the man that lies on the sand below,
A trumpet-song for the winds to blow
To seamen overdue.
Was it sudden or slow--the death that came?
Roaring water or sheets of flame?
The end with none to view?
No man can tell us the way he died,
But over the clouds Valkyries ride
To open the gates and hold them wide
For seamen overdue.
But whether the end was swift or slow,
By the Hand of God, or a German blow,
My messmate overdue--
You went to Death--and the whisper ran
As over the Gates the horns began,
_Splendour of God! We have found a man_--
Good-bye! Good luck to you!
Faint against the twilight, dim against the evening,
Fading into darkness against the lapping sea,
She sailed away from harbour, from safety into danger,
The ship that took him from me--my sailor boy from me.
He went away to join her, from me that loved and bore him,
Loved him ere I bore him, that was all the world to me.
"No time for leave, mother, must be back this evening,
Time for our patrol again, across the winter sea."
Six times over, since he went to join her,
Came he to see me, to run back again.
"Four hours' leave, mother--still got the steam up,
Going on patrol to-night--the old East lane."
"Seven times lucky, and perhaps we'll have a battle,
Then I'll bring a medal back and give it you to keep."
And his name is in the paper, with close upon a hundred,
Who lie there beside him, many fathom deep.
And beside him in the paper, somebody is writing,
--God! but how I hate him--a liar and a fool,--
"Where is the British Navy--is it staying in the harbours?
Has the Nelson spirit in the Fleet begun to cool?"
But thank your God you've helped to win the noblest War of all.
Away to the East in Flanders' mud, through Dante's dream of Hell,
Yes--thank your God your kin are there--the finest troops of all.
You may be stripped of all you have--it may be all you say,
got to earn.
_The last resort of Kings are we, but the voice of peoples too_--
When the Russian guns were roaring death and the Guard was
charging through.
_Ultima Ratio Regis, we--but he who has may hold,_
Se curantes Dei curant,
Hear the gunners that strain and pant,
As when before the rising gale the Great Armada rolled.
_Guns of fifty--sixty tons that roared at Jutland fight_,
Clatter and clang of hoisting shell;
See the flame where the salvo fell
Amidst the flash of German guns against the wall of white.
_The sons of English carronade or Spanish culverin_--
The Danish windows shivered and broke
When over the sea the children spoke,
And groaning turrets rocked again as we went out and in.
_We have no passions to call our own, we work for serf or lord,_
Load us well and sponge us clean--
Be your woman a slave or queen--
And we will clear the road for you who hold us by the sword.
_We come into our own again and wake to life anew_--
Put your paper and pens away,
For the whole of the world is ours to-day,
And we shall do the talking now to smooth the way for you.
_Howitzer gun or Seventy-five, the game is ours to play,_
And hills may quiver and mountains shake,
But the line in front shall bend or break.
We'll see the lights of England shine,
Flashing again on the steaming line,
As out of the dark the long grey hulls come rolling in from sea.
Showing a road we used to guess,
From the Shetland Isles to Dover cliffs--the shaded lane of war.
Tompions back in the guns to-night--
For English lights are meeting French across the Soldiers' Way.
Lizard along to the Isle of Wight,
Every lamp was burning bright,
Northern Lights or Trinity House--we had the news from you!
AS we were running the Channel along, with a rising wind abeam,
Steering home from an escort trip as fast as she could steam,
I'd just come up, relieving Bill, to look for Fritz again,
The Skipper 'e puts 'is glasses down, an' smilin' says to me,
"We needn't be pointin' guns at 'im--'e's one o' the R.F.C.
We don't expect to meet the Boche, or any o' his machines,
From here to France an' back again--except for submarines."
An' 'e looks again at the 'plane above, an' says, "I do believe
An' jolly good luck, says I, says I,
To you that's overhead;
An' may you never go dry, go dry,
Or want for a decent bed.
With yer gaudy patch, says I, says I,
Oh, may the bullets go by, go by,
An' not be findin' you.
Astonishing luck, says I, says I,
To you an' yer aeroplane;
An' if it's yer joss to die, to die,
When you go back again--
May the enemy say as you drop below,
An' you start your final dive:
"Three of us left to see him go,
An' it must be nice for him to know,
That wasn't afraid o' five."
When the breaking wavelets pass all sparkling to the sky,
When beyond their crests we see the slender masts go by,
When the glimpses alternate in bubbles white and green,
And funnels grey against the sky show clear and fair between,
When the word is passed along--"Stern and beam and bow"--
"Action stations fore and aft--all torpedoes now!"
When the hissing tubes are still, as if with bated breath
They waited for the word to loose the silver bolts of death,
When the Watch beneath the Sea shall crown the great Desire,
And hear the coughing rush of air that greets the word to fire,
We'll ask for no advantage, Lord--but only we would pray
That they may meet this boat of ours upon their outward way.
The moment we have waited long
Is closing on us fast,
When, cutting short the turret-gong,
We'll hear the Cordite's Battle-song
That hails the Day at last.
The clashing rams come driving forth
To meet the waiting shell,
And far away to East and North
Our targets steam to meet Thy Wrath,
And dare the Gates of Hell.
We do not ask Thee, Lord, to-day
To stay the sinking sun--
But hear Thy steel-clad servants pray,
And keep, O Lord, Thy mists away
Until Thy work is done.
Through the dark night
And the fury of battle
Pass the destroyers in showers of spray.
As the Wolf-pack to the flank of the cattle,
We shall close in on them--shadows of grey.
In from ahead,
Through shell-flashes red,
We shall come down to them, after the Day.
Whistle and crash
Of salvo and volley
Round us and into us while we attack.
Light on our target they'll flash in their folly,
Splitting our ears with the shrapnel-crack.
Fire as they will,
We'll come to them still,
Roar as they may at us--Back--Go Back!
White though the sea
To the shell-flashes foaming,
We shall be there at the death of the Hun.
Only we pray for a star in the gloaming
(Light for torpedoes and none for a gun).
Lord--of Thy Grace
Make it a race,
Over the sea with the night to run.
A tale is told of a captain bold
Of E-boat Seventy-two;
As E-boat captains do.
And off the mouth of the German Bight,
With Borkum on the bow,
(For enemy ships are hard to find--
You have to take them quick;
So copy the Eastern vulture's rule, that waits for days for an
Army mule--
Always ready to click.)
Out to the west from Helgoland
The big grey cruiser steered,
And the glinting rays of a rising sun flashed on funnel and
mast and gun,
And--Admiral Schultz's beard.
Down the wind the E-boat came
And passed the searching screen;
Nobody guessed the boat was there, till they heard the wallop and
Where the pride of the fleet had been.
'Twixt white and green of dancing waves
The racing tracks were seen,
And Poulson watching them get there, cried--_Hold the crockery--
Starboard side!_
_For the kick of a magazine!_
The escort ran and the cruisers ran
At the thought of an English snare;
Scattered and spread to left and right, to the friendly arms of
And left the ocean bare.
Then the coffee was spilt, the E-boat rolled
To a deuce of a shaking bang;
And Poulson swinging the eye-piece round,
Lifted eyebrows high,
For far aloft, when the smoke had cleared, he saw the flash of a
golden beard
Against the empty sky.
"Admiral over! _Surface_, lads!
He's flying a belted sword;
Pipe the side or stern or bow, stand to attention smartly now--
Wherever he comes aboard."
The Admiral landed Cabre-wise
And high the fountains burst--
They piped the side, and still they stood
To watch him struggle and heave,
Without the Admiral's leave).
They took him below, and sat him down
On the edge of the Captain's bed,--
Treatment vile for a foemen caught, they gave him a bottle of
Fiery, dark, and red.
They landed him at a Naval Base,
With S. two-twenty D.
And there he paced the carpet up,
And paced the carpet down,
"Alte Himmel!"--the prisoners cried--"Some one's trod on the
German pride,
And dared the Hansa frown!"
The Admiral called for a fountain pen
And Reference Sheets galore,
"_Can I believe your Lordships mean
To stand so idly by--
_Never shall I believe it true
That I should have to fall
Their Lordships read--and bells were heard
That woke the echoing past;
Beneath the wireless mast.
My Lords in solemn conclave drew
Behind a bolted door,
At four o'clock in the afternoon,
With tea-cups clattering past,
And I have the word of a lady fair
"_We find the Enemy Admiral's Note
Is based on Service Law--
_But he erred unknowing--so we shall mask
His breach of Service pomp,--
We'll make him an Admiral, D.S.B.--Acting--payless--biscuit free,
_We'll rate him at once as an A.I.O.
And now when Poulson sails to war
In E-boat Seventy-two,
The boatswains pipe and the bugles blare, "_Stand to attention--
forward there_!
_The Admiral's passing you!_"
That is the tale as told to me
By a friend from Beatty's Fleet,
 A letter-form which enables the sender to address his
Seniors more abruptly than he would dare to do without its
assistance.
 K.R.A.I. = King's Regulations and Admiralty Instructions.
The Council of Democracy around the table drew
(The table was a beauty--it was polished--it was new,
Twenty feet from side to side and half a mile in length,
Built of rosewood and mahogany of double extra strength.
The C in C had gone to jail to answer to the charge
Of saying what he thought about Democracy at large.
So the Council of Democracy had taken on the job,
After voting the removal of his Autocratic nob.
And the table was erected in a calm secluded spot,
Well away from any trenches, lest a voter should be shot).
And the Chairman raised a hammer and he hit the board a whack,
No one paid the least attention, so he put the hammer back.
Then he read the lengthy minutes of the gathering before,
To the ever-growing murmur of the Democratic snore.
And he put before the meeting all the questions of the day,
Such as "Shorter hours for Delegates, and seven times the pay."
With a minor matter for the end--"What shall the Council do
About this fellow Mackensen? they say he's coming through
With a hundred thousand hirelings of the Hohenzollern Line,
And breaking all the Union Rules by working after nine."
At this a group of Delegates departed for the door,
To consult with their constituents the conduct of the War.
The remainder started voting on the Delegation Pay,
And agreed with unanimity to seven quid a day.
They decided that unless the Germans travelled very fast,
His opinion--he departed for the Country of the Blest,
(Both in body and in spirit to the heavens he departed,
And the Council looked dispirited, though hardly broken-hearted).
One arose to ask a question--Bang!!--he went to Kingdom Come.
"Mr Chairman," cried a Delegate. "A point of order! I
Don't believe the Huns are coming--it's an Autocratic lie.
I shall move the Army question do be left upon the Table,
And I'm going home to England just as fast as I am able."
Then he gathered up his papers, and was pushing back his chair,
When a heavy high explosive sent him sailing in the air.
The Chairman beat his hammer on the table all the while,
Yelling oaths and calling "Order" in a Democratic style.
But the Delegates were started on the question of the War,
(So as not to waste the speeches that they'd written out before).
Let the Germans have it hearty from its Democratic lungs.
And in groups of ten and twenty they were blasted into space
By the disrespectful cannon of an Autocratic race,
Till the gathering had dwindled to an incoherent few,
Who were still explaining volubly what England ought to do,
When the cannon ceased abruptly and they heard the Germans cheer,
Vorwaerts, Carl der Kindermoerder--use your bayonet, Saxon ass!"
Faithful to the last, the Chairman, spying strangers all around,
Maimed and crippled are we to-day, but free from curse or blow--
We drift away to the homes we left a thousand years ago,
The broken men that the War has left to shun the gaze of all.
Is it nothing to you that pass us by--hurrying on your way,
Whispering low of peace and rest to the tune of a German song?
Only but for the Grace of God you might be where we lay--
With festering wounds in a truck for beasts, the butt
of a laughing throng.
Peace and Rest? The peace will come when God shall stay His hand,
We are broken and down in the fight of the world for an end
to heathen lust,
to rust,
The curse of the captive men be yours--the day when you forget--!
(Written after reading the story of that name in 'A Diversity
Back and away from Tyrian hate with us to Rome again."
Out on the wharf he walked from those--that wailed and wept
to see him go;
And hand in his she walked with him--her royal head on high.
Of all the women of Rome to-night, no pride shall equal mine.
A God, the man that leaves me now--but ah! a lover that
thought me worth--
The whispered word of a husband true--I thank the Gods that
I hold from you
The right that fair Eurydice knew--the love of a man Divine."
The wind that whispered softly over Kiel across the Bay,
Died away as the dark closed down,
Till the Dockyard glare showed the ending of the day
In the silence of the night as the big ships swung
To the buoys as the flood-tide made,
Came a clamour from the wind like a shield that is rung
By a foemen's blade.
Far above the masts where the wireless showed,
Traced out against a star-lit sky,
A voice called down from the Whist-hound's road
Where the clouds went by--
Listen down below--In the High Sea Fleet,
For a signal that was shouted up to me
By the sailors that I left on the old, old beat,
Far out in the cold North Sea.
They shouted up to me as the glass went down,
And they ducked to the North-West spray,
"Will you take a message to the Fortress-Town,
And the Fleet that is lying in the Bay?
"Say that we are waiting in the waters of the North,
And we'll wait till the seas run dry--
Or the High Sea Fleet from the Bight comes forth,
And the twelve-inch shells go by.
"We have waited very long, but we haven't any doubt
They are longing for the day we'll meet.
But tell 'em as you pass that the sooner they are out,
All the better for the English Fleet.
"For when we see 'em sinking--(they'll be fighting to the last,
And for those that are lost we'll grieve,)
We will cheer for a signal at the Flagship's mast--
On arrival at the Base--Long Leave!"
"The German Fleet is coming,"
The Sunday papers say,
"And the shell will soon be humming
When they fix upon the Day."
All the Sunday experts write,
Working very late at night--
"They are coming--they'll be on you any day."
Though it's very cheery reading,
And we hear it ev'ry week;
Yet the Hun is still unheeding,
And is just as far to seek.
And it seems so unavailing
They should write and tell us so--
If the Hun is shortly sailing,
Couldn't _some one_ let him know?
We are ready, and we're waiting,
And we know they're going to fight;
And we're just as good at hating
As the Brainy Ones that write.
But they talk of Information
They have gathered unbeknown--
That "the mighty German Nation
Is a mass of skin and bone."
And they take their affidavy
That a fight is due at sea:
_Dammit--tell the German Navy_,
What's the use of telling me?
All our fighting brothers are away across the foam,
Here's a chance for Englishmen living safe at home,
Make a lot of money while you can!
We are fighting for the Right and the Honour of the Race
With the Bulldog Grip they know;
Who's the silly novice there putting on the pace?
You'll be taken for a Yank--Go slow!
All the Nations know us as the finest of the Earth;
Three cheers for the lads in blue!
An' we're drawing extra wages that are more than we are worth--
But a half-day's work will do.
The shades of England's fighting men are watching us with pride
As we live for England's fame;
To save us for posterity was why they went and died--
Oh! The War is a real fine game!
Let the War go rolling on alone for awhile,
Let the line stand fast in the West;
Let 'em learn to use the bayonet in the grand old style,
While the Bulldog Boys have a rest.
What's the good of hurrying? British pluck'll win;
We can stand to the strain all right.
What about another rise? Send the notice in--
Just to show how the Bulldogs fight.
Chorus! all together--We're the finest race of all,
So beware of the English Blade;
Now the fighting men are gone--why, however many fall,
All the more for the lads that stayed.
Too proud to fight? I'm not so sure--our skipper now and then
Has lectured to us on patrol on foreign ships and men,
And other nation's submarines, when cruising round the Bight;
And 'seems to me--when they begin--the Yankee chaps can fight.
Why, if I was in the army (which I ain't--and no regrets)
And had my pick of Generals--from London's latest pets,
To Hannibal and Wellington--to follow whom I chose,
I wouldn't think about it long--I'd give the job to those
Who fought across a continent for three long years and more
(I bet the neutral papers didn't say in 'sixty-four
Of Jackson, Sherman, Lee and Grant--"The Yanks can only shout"--
That lot was somewhere near the front when pluck was handed out);
Successful submarine attack before this war begun,
And it wasn't on a liner on the easy German plan,
But on a well-found man-of-war, and Dixon was the man
Who showed us how to do the trick, a tip for me and you,
And I'd like to keep the standard up of Dixon and his crew,
For they hadn't got a submarine that cost a hundred thou',
But a leaky little biscuit-box, and stuck upon her bow
A spar torpedo like a mine, and they and Dixon knew
That if they sank the enemy they'd sink the _David_ too.
She'd drowned a crew or two before--they dredged her up again,
And manned and pushed her off to sea.--My oath, it's pretty plain
In a craft they knew was rather more a coffin than a ship;
And they carried out a good attack, and did it very well.
As a model for the future, why, it beats the books to Hell,
A tradition for the U.S.A., and, yes--for England too;
For they were men with English names, and kin to me and you,
And I'd like to claim an ancestor with Dixon when he died
At the bottom of the river at the _Housatonic's_ side."
And the Blue Ridge called to the Shenandoah stream,
As the Massanutton hills grew black--
"Look your last, Shenandoah--where the bayonets gleam,
On your man who is never coming back.
"Ah! Manassas, look again on the glimmer of the steel
That you lit with the red fires' glow,
When the Grey men roared at an all-night meal,
Look again as the Grey men go.
"He is looking back at us with a hand across his eyes,
Look your last, Shenandoah, as he rides
To a death beyond the Gap where the dust-clouds rise,
O'er the road that the greenwood hides.
"He will send a message back as the dark clouds lower,
And you'll hear it in the sighing of the breeze,
_Let us pass across the river (can you hear me, Shenandoah?)
To a rest in the shadow of the trees_."
"... And will remain on your Patrol till the 8th
The North-East Wind came armed and shod from the ice-locked
Baltic shore,
Over the Bight to the open sea the great wind sang as he sheered:
Taking it every lurch and roll in tons of icy green
Came out to her two-year-old patrol--an English submarine.
The voice of the wind rose up and howled through squalls of
driving white:
Over the crest of a lifting sea in bursting shells of spray,
She showed the flash of her rounded side as over to port she lay,
"_I serve the Lord of the Seven Seas. Ha! Splendour of God--
Twenty feet of her bow came out, dripping and smooth it sprang,
Over the valley of green below as her stamping engines rang;
(Rank upon rank the seas swept on and broke to let her through,
your teeth I'll fling,
I am your master--Overlord, and--Dog of the English King!_"
In the Diving-room, where the O.O.D. his weary vigil keeps,
With bristling fur as she dreams anew of many a noble fray.
Swift in the onslaught
As the great eagle
Stoops to the victim;
Dreadful--prolific,
Mother of hundreds,
Messenger-biter.
Hail to the guard of the _Maidstone's_ Gangway--Skoal!
Sing of the day the air was full of words like "Alabaster,"
Turning the dogs back--
Yelping and howling.
Biting her masters--
Corporals--any one
Fiercely domestic,
Easily queen of--
Pugnacious obstetrics--
Hail to the terror and pride of the _Maidstone_--Skoal!!
Sing of the day she won the fray with a new "Pandora" dog,
And the Quartermaster shone with pride as he entered in the log:
"At 10 P.M. we dowsed our pipes and drew the _Nettle's_ fires,
At 10.15 six births aboard--_that blinkin' cat of ours_!"
 O.O.D.--Officer of the day.
Our brothers of the landward side
Are bound by Church and stall,
By Councils OEcumenical,
By Gothic arches tall;
But we who know the cold grey sea,
The salt and flying spray,
We praise the Lord in our fathers' way,
In the simple faith of the sea we pray,
To the God that the winds and waves obey
Who sailed on Galilee.
We pray as the Flag-Lieutenant prayed,
At St Vincent's cabin door
(Twenty sail of the line in view--
South-West by South they bore):
"O Lord of Hosts, I praise Thee now,
And bow before Thy might,
Who has given us fingers and hands to fight,
And twenty ships of the line in sight;
Thou knewest, O Lord, and placed them right--
To leeward, on the bow."
That far-off day when Peace is signed (and all the papers say--
"A most important by-election starts at Kew to-day;
We urge our readers one and all to loyally support
Will change a lot of little things--perhaps we'll get some leave,
The salvage ships will hurry out, two thousand wrecks to find,
The monuments to Kultur that the Huns have left behind.
We'll watch the sweepers put to sea ten million mines to seek,
And--Patrol Flotilla Exercise will start within a week;
Will receive a little notice headed "Maintenance of Boilers,"
"To economise in fuel while the ships are out at sea
Each pound of steam will count as two, and every knot as three."
We'll have the old manoeuvre Rules to show us what to do.
"I rose within two thousand yards and have torpedoed you,"
"My counter-claim is obvious--to port you must retire,"
"I sank you with a Maxim gun just as you rose to fire."
Ships will carry navigation lights--"Precautionary Measure,"
Not been held since nineteen--("half a minute, surely you've
Hush, you'll get me into trouble ("it was eighteen months ago--
To meet in sixty-twenty North and have a morning fight.
No ship should cross a line between the Jahde and Amrum Bank,
But should a German flag be seen (unless of junior rank),_
_No captain can do very wrong who indicates by guns--
We won't have our manoeuvres spoilt by interfering Huns._
Perhaps the wording isn't right, perhaps it isn't true,
For all the "Truths about the War," by "One who has no fear,"
And all the "Contract Scandals," by "A Clerk behind the Door,"
The book I want to see in print is "Humours of the War,"
Though I fear the other Censor (Morals, Cinemas, and Vice)
Would expurgate the best of them as being hardly nice;
Still, even with the cream suppressed a volume could be filled
With the epigrams of killing and the jokes of being killed,
With a preface by the officer we rescued from the wave,
When a cloud of steam and lyddite smoke lay o'er the
"Bluecher's" grave,
Who, as the bowmen fished him out and passed him aft to dry,
Read the name upon their ribbons with a twinkle in his eye,
And said: "A Westo ship, I think--I guess my luck is in,
I'm sick of German substitutes--now for some Plymouth gin."
And a picture of the sailor in a certain submarine,
And broke the silence following the last appalling thud
With "Good old ruddy Kaiser! there's another bloomin' dud!"
There's a story too of Jutland, or perhaps another show,
When the cruisers and destroyers had a meeting with the foe;
And as the range was closing, and they waited for the word,
From a sailor at an after-gun the following was heard:
"It isn't _that_ that turns me up--'e's not the only one"--
But then the roar of ranging guns--the action had begun--
And for twenty awful minutes there was undiluted hell,
With flame and steam and cordite smoke and high-explosive shell.
Then as the bugle-call rang out, the savage fire to check,
The loading numbers wiped their brows and looked around the deck:
I think 'e should 've married 'er--if 'e'd bin 'alf a man."
_We sailed from the sand-isles,
War-ready all of us.
Soon came the sea-mist,
Soft was the wind then,
Lay there the long-ships,
Lifting and falling.
Then cried the Captain:
"Cold is the sea-fog,
Weary is waiting-time,
Wet are the byrnies;
Burnish the breastplates,
Broadswords and axes!
Hand we the horns round,
Our gentle pirate ancestors from off the Frisian Isles
Kept station where we now patrol so many weary miles:
There were no International Laws of Hall or Halleck then,
They only knew the simple rule of "Death to beaten men."
And what they judged a lawful prize was any sail they saw
From Scarboro' to the sandy isles along the Saxon shore.
We differ from our ancestors' conception of a prize,
And we cruise about like Agag 'neath Sir Samuel Evans' eyes;
But on one eternal subject we would certainly agree:
It's seldom you can see a mile across the Northern sea,
For as the misty clouds came down and settled wet and cold,
The prize of all the prizes must be passing out of sight;
And drearily they waited while metheglin in a skin
Was passed along the benches, and the oars came sliding in;
Then scramasax and battleaxe were polished up anew,
And they waited for the fog to lift, the same as me and you;
Though we're waiting on the bottom at the twenty fathom line,
We are burnishing torpedoes to a Sunday morning shine.
The sailor pauses as he quaffs his tot of Navy rum,
And listens to a noise that drowns the circulator's hum:
Two o' the morn, and a rising sea, I'd like to ease to slow,
But we're off on a stunt and pressed for time, so I reckon it's
Up she comes on a big grey sea and winks at the misty moon,
out of tune--
Look-out, you fool. Hang on!
You can feel her shake from stem to stern with the crash of her
plunging bow,
The streaky water rushes by as the crest of the sea goes past,
And you see her hull from the hydroplanes to the heel of her
wireless mast
Stand out and hang as she leaps the trough to dive at the next
Look-out, you fool. Hang on!
In the hollow between she stops for breath, then starts her
climb anew--
diving through"--
Look-out, you fool. Hang on!
Look-out, you fool. Hang on!
I wish that I could be a Hun, to dive about the sea--
I wouldn't go for merchantmen, a man-of-war for me;
There are lots of proper targets for attacking, little Fritz,
But you seem to like the merchantmen, and blowing them to bits.
I suppose it must be easy fruit to get an Iron Cross
By strafing sail and cargo ships--but don't you feel the loss
Of the wonderful excitement when you face a man-of-war,
And tearing past you overhead the big propellers roar?
Although perhaps you can't be blamed--your motives may be pure--
You're rather new to submarines--in fact, an amateur;
But we'd like to take your job awhile and show you how it's done,
You wouldn't like the job, my lad--the motors turning slow,
You wouldn't like the winter-time--storm and wind and snow;
You'd find it weary waiting, Fritz--unless your faith is strong--
"Give us a ten-knot breeze, O Lord, with a clear and blazing sky,
_Land of sorrow--war and weeping,
Granite rock and falling snow,
Where Romance is never sleeping,
Where the fires of freedom glow._
Where the spark has never died, be the cause however lost,
Be the breath however humble that would fan it to a flame;
From the shieling, from the castle, did they ever count the cost
Ere they went to meet a rebel's death and perished for a name?
While England learnt the Roman tongue and paid her tax to Gaul,
The Caledonian tribute clashed along the Roman wall--
From East to West the sentinels looked out towards the North--
"_Amboglanna has sent for aid,
For the heather is bright with targe and blade
Away to the silvery Forth._"
When the Scottish host looked down and scorned to charge the foe
That filed around the fatal hill and crossed the stream below,
When the flowers of the forest fell and withered in the fight--
"_Shoulder to shoulder around the King,
Hear the Claymore whistle and sing
Our funeral song to-night._"
The English knew it at Prestonpans--the wall against their backs,
"Steady the volleys, the leading rank!"
The fires were blazing then._
The prayer of Anglo-Saxon priests a thousand years ago--
"From the fury of the Northern men, deliver us, O Lord."
They called across to Peter at the changing of the Guard,
At the red-gold Doors that the Angels keep,--
"Send us help to the Portal, for they press upon us hard,
They are straining at the Gate, many deep."
Then Peter rose and went to the wicket by the Wall,
Where the Starlight flashed upon the crowd;
And he saw a mighty wave from the Greatest Gale of all
Break beneath him with a roar, swelling loud--
"_Let us in! Let us in! We have left a load of sin
On the battlefield that flashes far below.
From the trenches or the sea there's a pass for such as we,
For we died with our faces to the foe.
"We haven't any creed, for we never felt the need,
And our morals are as ragged as can be;
But we finished in a way that has cleared us of the clay,
And we're coming to you clean, as you can see."_
Then Peter looked below him with a smile upon his lips,
And he answered, "Ye are fighters, as I know
By your badges of the air, of the trenches, and the ships,
And the wounds that on your bodies glisten so."
And he looked upon the wounds, that were many and were grim,
And his glance was all-embracing--unafraid;
And he looked to meet the eyes that were smiling up to him,
All a-level as a new-forged blade.
"Ye are savage men and rough--from the fo'c'sle and the tent;
Ye have put High Heaven to alarm;
But I see it written clear by the road ye went,
That ye held by the Fifteenth Psalm."
And they shouted in return, "_'Tis a thing we've never read,
But you passed our friends inside
That won to the end of the road we tread
Long ago when the Mons Men died._"
"_Let us in! Let us in! We have fallen for the Right,
And the Crown that we listed to win,
That we earned by the Somme or the waters of the Bight;
You're a fighting man yourself--Let us in!_"
Then Peter gave a sign and the Gates flung wide
To the sound of a bugle-call:
"Pass the fighting men to the ranks inside,
Who came from the earth or the cold grey tide,
With their heads held high and a soldiers stride,
Rusty side and dingy paintwork, stripped for war and cleared
for battle--
Saw the harbour-tugs around us--smelt the English fields again,--
Out again as fell the evening, down the harbour in the gloaming
With the sailors on the fo'c'sle looking wistfully a-lee--
Just another year of waiting--just another year of roaming
For the Majesty of England--for the Freedom of the Sea.
When the galleys of Phoenicia, through the gates of Hercules,
Steered South and West along the coast to seek the Tropic Seas,
When they rounded Cape Agulhas, putting out from Table Bay,
They started trading North again, as steamers do to-day.
They dealt in gold and ivory and ostrich feathers too,
With a little private trading by the officers and crew,
Till rounding Guardafui, steering up for Aden town,
The tall Phoenician Captain called the First Lieutenant down.
"By all the Tyrian purple robes that you will never wear,
By the Temples of Zimbabwe, by King Solomon I swear,
The ship is like a stable, like a Carthaginian sty.
I am Captain here--confound you!--or I'll know the reason why.
Every sailor in the galley has a monkey or a goat;
There are parrots in the eyes of her and serpents in the boat.
By the roaring fire of Baal, I'll not have it any more:
Heave them over by the sunset, or I'll hang you at the fore!"
"What is that, sir? _Not_ as cargo? _Not_ a bit of private trade?
Standing there and looking silly: _leave the animals alone_."
(Sailors with a tropic liver always have a brutal tone.)
"By the crescent of Astarte, I am not religious--yet--
I would sooner spill the table salt than kill a sailor's pet."
You wrote a pretty hymn of Hate,
That won the Kaiser's praise,
Which showed your nasty mental state,
And made us laugh for days.
I can't compete with such as you
In doggerel of mine,
But this is certain--_and_ it's true,
You bloody-handed swine--
We do not mouth a song of hate, or talk about you--much,
We do not mention things like you--it wouldn't be polite;
One doesn't talk in drawing-rooms of Prussian dirt and such,
We only want to kill you off--so roll along and fight.
For men like you with filthy minds, you leave a nasty taste,
We can't forget your triumphs with the girls you met in France.
By your standards of morality, gorillas would be chaste,
And you consummate your triumphs with the bayonet and the lance.
You give us mental pictures of your officers at play,
With naked girls a-dancing on the table as you dine,
With their mothers cut to pieces, in the knightly German way,
In the corners of the guard-room in a pool of blood and wine.
You had better stay in Germany, and never go abroad,
For wherever you may wander you will find your fame has gone,
For you are outcasts from the lists, with rust upon your sword--
The blood of many innocents--of children newly born.
You are bestial men and beastly, and we would not ask you home
To meet our wives and daughters, for we doubt that you are clean;
You--who love to hear the screaming of a girl beneath the knife,
In the midst of your companions, with their craning, eager necks;
You are not exactly gentlemen towards the gentle sex.
With your rapings in the market-place and slaughter of the weak,
You show surprise at our disgust, and say you're not to blame.
We don't want any whinings, and we'd sooner wait for peace
Till you realise your position, and you know you whine in vain;
And you stand within a circle of the Cleaner World's Police,
And we goad you into charging--and we clean the world again.
For you should know that never shall you meet us as before,
That none will take you by the hand or greet you as a friend;
So stay with it, and finish it--who brought about the War--
The way of a ship at racing speed
In a bit of a rising gale,
The way of a horse of the only breed
At a Droxford post-and-rail,
The way of a brand-new aeroplane
On a frosty winter dawn.
You'll come back to those again;
Wheel or cloche or slender rein
Will keep you young and clean and sane,
And glad that you were born.
The power and drive beneath me now are above the power of kings,
It's mine the word that lets her loose and in my ear she sings--
"Mark now the way I sport and play with the rising hunted sea,
Across my grain in cold disdain their ranks are hurled at me;
But down my wake is a foam-white lake, the remnant of their line,
An artist's vision in steel and bronze for gods and men to serve.
It ought to be you--my racing girl--as the Amazon song you sing.
Down the valley and up the slope we run from scent to view.
"Steady, you villain--you know too much--I'm not so wild as you;
You'll get me cursed if you catch him first--there's at least
a mile to go,
things to see;
Your easy gallop and bending neck are signals flying to me.
You wouldn't refuse if it was wire with calthrops down in front,
And there we are with a foot to spare--you best of all the Hunt!"
of floating tail,
A fine old Irish gentleman, and a Hampshire post-and-rail.
The sun on the fields a mile below is glinting off the grass
That slides along like a rolling map as under the clouds I pass.
The early shadows of byre and hedge are dwindling dark below
As up the stair of the morning air on my idle wheels I go,--
Nothing to do but let her alone--she's flying herself to-day;
Unless I chuck her about a bit--there isn't a bump or sway.
So _there's_ a bank at ninety-five--and here's a spin and
a spiral dive,
And here we are again.
And I and the aeroplane
And now we're rolling back.
And _this_ is the way we climb and stall and sit up and beg on
nothing at all,
The wires and strainers slack.
And now we'll try and be good some more, and open the throttle
and hear her roar
And steer for London Town.
For there never a pilot yet was born who flew a machine on a
frosty morn
But started stunting soon,
To feel if his wires were really there, or whether he flew
on ice or air,
Or whether his hands were gloved or bare,
Or he sat in a free balloon.
Back from battle, torn and rent,
Listing bridge and stanchions bent
By the angry sea.
By Thy guiding mercy sent,
Fruitful was the road we went--
Back from battle we.
If Thou hadst not been, O Lord, behind our feeble arm,
If Thy hand had not been there to slam the lyddite home,
When against us men arose and sought to work us harm,
We had gone to death, O Lord, in spouting rings of foam.
Heaving sea and cloudy sky
Saw the battle flashing by
As Thy foemen ran.
By Thy grace, that made them fly,
We have seen two hundred die
Since the fight began.
If our cause had not been Thine, for Thy eternal Right,
If the foe in place of us had fought for Thee, O Lord!
If Thou hadst not guided us and drawn us there to fight,
Through the iron rain they fled,
Bearing home the tale of dead,
Flying from Thy sword.
After-hatch to fo'c'sle head,
We have turned their decks to red,
By Thy help, O Lord!
It was not by our feeble sword that they were overthrown,
When down the line the guns began, and sang Thy praise aloud.
Sixty miles of running fight,
Finished at the dawning light,
Thou that helped throughout the night
Weary hand and aching sight,
We are coming from the ranch, from the city and the mine,
And the word has gone before us to the towns upon the Rhine;
As the rising of the tide
On the Old-World side,
We are coming to the battle, to the Line.
From the valleys of Virginia, from the Rockies in the North,
We are coming by battalions, for the word was carried forth:
"We have put the pen away,
And the sword is out to-day,
For the Lord has loosed the Vintages of Wrath."
We are singing in the ships as they carry us to fight,
As our fathers sang before us by the camp-fires' light;
In the wharf-light glare
They can hear us Over There,
When the ships come steaming through the night.
Right across the deep Atlantic where the _Lusitania_ passed,
With the battle-flag of Yankeeland a-floating at the mast,
We are coming all the while,
Over twenty hundred mile,
And were staying to the finish, to the last.
We are many--we are one--and we're in it overhead,
We are coming as an Army that has seen its women dead,
Will be loud above the shell
When we cross the top together, seeing red.
should say,
When you know your arms are only wax, your hands of useless lead,
And through your brain the whisper comes,
"Give in, you've done your best,"--
Why, stiffen your knees and brace your back, and take my
word as true--
_If the man in front has got you weak, he's just as
tired as you_.
He can't attack through a gruelling fight and finish
as he began;
He's done more work than you to-day--you're just as fine a man.
So call your last reserve of pluck--he's careless
with his chin--
You'll put it across him every time--Go in--Go in--_Go in_!
I must hold her bow to windward now till I'm relieved again--
To the pipe and wail of a tearing gale,
And I stoop to look at the compass-card as closes in the night,
For it's hard to see by the shaded glow of half a candle-light;
Foggy and thick and a windy trick,
Heave and sway or dive and roll can never disturb me now;
Though seas may sweep in rivers of foam across the straining bow,
In Davy's realm, still at the helm,
They called us up from England at the breaking of the day,
And the wireless whisper caught us from a hundred leagues away--
All that hold the countersign,
Listen in the North Sea--news for you to-day."
All across the waters, at the paling of the morn,
The wireless whispered softly ere the summer day was born--
"Be you near or ranging far,
By the Varne or Weser bar,
The Fleet is out and steaming to the Eastward and the dawn."
Far and away to the North and West, in the dancing glare of the
sunlit ocean,
world in motion,
sun-track held,
And we looked back to the West again, and saw the English Fleet.
Over the curve of the rounded sea, in ordered lines as the
ranks of Rome,
Miles of racing lines of steel that flattened the sea to a
field of foam,
Rolling deep to the wash they made,
We saw, to the threat of a German blade,
The Shield of England come.
The sentries at the Castle Gate,
We hold the outer wall,
That echoes to the roar of hate
And savage bugle-call--
Of those that seek to enter in with steel and eager flame,
To leave you with but eyes to weep the day the Germans came.
Though we may catch from out the Keep
A whining voice of fear,
Of one who whispers "Rest and sleep,
And lay aside the spear,"
We pay no heed to such as he, as soft as we are hard;
We take our word from men alone--the men that rule the guard.
We hear behind us now and then
The voices of the grooms,
And bickerings of serving-men
Come faintly from the rooms;
But let them squabble as they please, we will not turn aside,
But--curse to think it was for them that fighting men have died.
Whatever they may say or try,
We shall not pay them heed;
And though they wail and talk and lie,
We hold our simple Creed--
No matter what the cravens say, however loud the din,
Our Watch is on the Castle Gate, and none shall enter in.
When the battle-worn Horatius, 'midst the cheering Roman throng--
Reached the polished porch of marble at the doorway of his home,
He felt himself an Emperor--the bravest man of Rome.
The people slapped him on the back and knocked his helm askew,
Then drifted back along the road to look for something new.
Then Horatius sobered down a bit--as you would do to-day--
And straightened down his tunic in a calm, collected way.
He hung his battered helmet up and wiped his sandals dry,
And set a parting in his hair--the same as you and I.
His lady kissed him carefully and looked him up and down,
And gently disengaged his arm to spare her snowy gown.
"You _are_ a real disgrace, you know, the worst I've ever seen;
Now go and put your sword away, I _know_ it isn't clean.
hitting low."
Then she hustled lots of water, turning back her pretty sleeves,
And she set him on the sofa (having taken off his greaves).
And bold Horatius purred aloud, the stern Horatius smiled,
And didn't seem to mind that he was treated like a child.
Though she didn't call him Emperor, or cling to him and cry,
Yet I rather think he liked it--just the same as you and I.
I'm the donkey-man of a dingy tramp
They launched in 'Eighty-one,
An' she an' meself are off to sea
From out o' the breaker's hands,
An' we laugh to find such an altered game, for devil a thing we
found the same
When we came off the land.
We used to carry a freight of trash
That younger ships would scorn,
We used to sneak an' smouch along
Wi' rusty side an' rails,
We sometimes met--an' took their wash--
The 'aughty ships o' war,
An' we dips to them--an' they to us--an' on they went in a
tearin' fuss,
But now they count us more.
For now we're "England's Hope and Pride"--
"Bring us the goods and food we lack, because we're hungry,
(As often I have been).
"You're the man to save us now,
We look to you to win;
An' here we are in the danger zone,
Wi' escorts all around,
Destroyers a-racing to and fro--"We will show you the way to go,
An' guide you safe an' sound."
"An' did you cross in a comfy way,
Or did you have to run?
An' is the patch on your hull we see the mark of a bump
in 'Ninety-three,
Or the work of a German gun?"
"We'll lead you now, and keep beside,
An' call to all the Fleet,
Yes, we're the hope of England now,
And rank wi' the Navy too;
"Be polite to Merchant Jack,
Who brings you in the meat,
For if he went on a striking lay, you'd have to go on your
knees and pray,
With never a bone to eat."
But you can lay your papers down
An' set your fears aside,
For we will keep the ocean free--we o' the clean an' open sea--
To break the German pride.
We won't go canny or strike for pay,
Or say we need a rest;
But you get on wi' the blinkin' War--an' not so much o' your
strikes ashore,
Or givin' the German best.
When the foe is pressing and the shells come down
In a stream like maxim fire,
When the long grey ranks seem to thicken all the while,
And they stamp on the last of the wire,
When all along the line comes a whisper on the wind
That you hear through the drumming of the guns:
"They are through over there and the right is in the air,
And there isn't any end to the Huns,"--
Then keep along a-shooting till you can't shoot more,
And hit 'em with a shovel on the head.
Don't forget a lot of folk have beaten them before,
And a Hun'll never hurt you if he's dead.
If you're in a hole and your hopes begin to fail,
If you're in a losing fight,
Think a bit of Jonah in the belly of the whale,
When the Spartan heroes tried
To hold the broken gate,
When--roaring like the rising tide--
The Persian horsemen charged and died
In foaming waves of hate.
When with armour hacked and torn
They gripped their shields of brass,
And hailed the gods that light the morn
With battle-cry of hope forlorn,
"We shall not let them pass."
While they combed their hair for death
Before the Persian line,
They spoke awhile with easy breath,
"What think ye the Athenian saith
In Athens as they dine?"
"Doth he repent that we alone
Are here to hold the way,
That he must reap what he hath sown--
That only valour may atone
The fault of yesterday?
"Is he content that thou and I--
Three hundred men in line--
Should show him thus how man may try
To stay the foemen passing by
To Athens, where they dine?
"Ah! now the clashing cymbal rings,
The mighty host is nigh;
Let Athens talk of passing things--
But here, three hundred Spartan kings
Shall greet the fame the Persian brings
To men about to die."
There's a whistle of the wind in the rigging overhead,
And the tune is as plain as can be.
"Hey! down below there--d'you know it's going to blow there,
All across the cold North Sea?"
And along comes the gale from the locker in the North
By the Storm-King's hand set free,
And the wind and the snow and the sleet come forth,
Let loose to the cold North Sea.
Tumble out the oilskins, the seas are running white,
There's a wet watch due for me,
For we're heading to the east, and a long wet night
As we drive at the cold North Sea.
See the water foaming as the waves go by
Like the tide on the sands of Dee;
Hear the gale a-piping in the halliards high
To the tune of the cold North Sea.
See how she's meeting them, plunging all the while,
Till I'm wet to the sea-boot knee;
See how she's beating them--twenty to the mile--
The waves of the cold North Sea.
Right across from Helgoland to meet the English coast,
Lie better than the likes of we,--
Men that lived in many ways, but went to join the host
That are buried by the cold North Sea.
Rig along the life-lines, double-stay the rails,
Lest the Storm-King call for a fee;
For if any man should slip, through the rolling of the ship,
He'd be lost in the cold North Sea.
We are heading to the gale, and the driving of the sleet,
And we're far to the east of Three.
Hey! you German sailormen, here's the British Fleet
Waiting in the cold North Sea.
A long low ship from the Orkneys' sailed,
With a full gale driving her along,
Three score sailormen singing as they baled
To the tune of a Viking song--
_We have a luck-charm
Carved on the tiller,
Cut in the fore-room
See we Thor's Hammer;
Gods will protect us
Under a shield-burgh,
Carved in the mast we--
But the Earl called down from the kicking tiller-head,
"Six hands lay along to me!
Tumble out the hawsers there, Skallagrim the Red!
For a battle with a Berserk sea;
Sing a song of work, of a well-stayed mast,
Of clinch and rivet and pine,
Of a bull's-hide sail we can carry to the last
Of a well-built ship like mine.
Never mind the Runes on the bending tree
Or the charms on the tiller that I hold,
Trust to your hands and the Makers of the Sea,
To the gods of the Viking bold!
We are not thralls here
--Men of the sea;
We are not idle,
Fight we as seamen,
Worthy your aid then
In the evening--in the sunset--when the long day dies,
Out across the broad Atlantic, where the great seas go,
When the Golden Gates are open and the sunlight flies,
The fairy Islands drift and fade against the crimson glow.
In the evening, when the fiery sun was sinking in the West,
St Brandan and the chosen few went sailing out to sea,--
To the Westward--to the sunset--to the Golden Isle of rest,
The haven of the weary men, the land of Fairie.
Is it only in the sunset we may find the Golden Fleece?
Is it only to the Westward that the Fairyland is found?
And those who went away from us and passed from war to peace--
Are they looking still for Fairyland the wide world round?
Then as I gazed across the dark the morning answer came--
To Eastward stretched the golden sea for many a golden mile;
The far horizon joined the sky in dancing lines of flame--
And drifting on the seas of dawn, I saw St Brandan's Isle.