The song of the sea-adventurers, that never were known to fame,
The roving, roistering mariners that builded our England's name:
—Foolhardy, reckless, undaunted,
—Death they courted and taunted:
In the jaws of hell their flag they flaunted, answering flame with flame.
An endless pageant of power and pride, they steer from the long-ago
From quays that moulder beneath the tide, from cities whose walls lie low:
—Carrack and sloop and galley,
—Out of the dark they rally,
As homing birds over hill and valley, back to the land they know.
The crews of the Bristol Guinea-men, that traded to Old Calabar,
Fading for years out of English ken in sweltering seas afar;
—The Danes and the Dutch they raced there,
—The Brandenburgers they chased there,
They bid the Portingale cargoes waste there, under an evil star.
Their ships came back from the Cameroons, ragged and patched and old,
With decks roof-thatched from the Accra noons—but down in their sultry hold,
—Battened from wind and weather,
—Were coral and ostrich feather,
Jasper and ivory heaped together, amber and dust of gold.
The Greenland skippers that speared the whale at the edge of the grinding floe,
Icicles fringing sheet and sail, and decks in a smother of snow:
—Men of Clyde and of Humber,
—Cold is their Arctic slumber,
But their deeds of daring that none may number shall live while the north winds blow.
The stately captains of barque and brig, in the days of the good Queen Anne;
Under each powdered periwig was the brain of a sea-bred man.
—Was there work to be done? they did it:
—Was there danger? they pressed amid it:
Wounded to death, with a smile they hid it, and perished as sailors can.
The filibusters of Tudor years, that held the ocean in fee,
The buccaneers and the privateers, the outlawed sons of the sea:
—Terrible, swift, unsleeping,
—Like bolts from the azure leaping,
Like birds of prey on their quarry sweeping, foraging far and free.
The pigtailed bo's'ns of Anson and Cook, and the seafaring men they led—
Who has counted in song or book the roll of those glorious dead?
—On the desolate isles uncharted
—Their valorous souls departed:
They fought—they fell—and in death, blithe-hearted, cheered as the foeman fled.
The men that talked with a Devon twang, as they hoisted the sails of Drake—
All through the West their rumor rang, the pride of the Dons to break,
—Fierce to seize and to sunder
—The golden argosies' plunder,
The New World's dread and the Old World's wonder, splendid for England's sake.
The coasting-craft and the fishing-craft, lugger and ketch and hoy,
With a duck-gun fore and a blunderbuss aft, served by a man and a boy;
—Their tiny armaments flinging
—On frigate and gun-boat—bringing
Prizes and prisoners home with singing, fired with a desperate joy.
Ruffed to the chin, or laced to the knee, or stripped to the waist for fight,
Herding the alien hordes of the sea to fields of defeat and flight,
—Or, lit by the lightning's flashing,
—Close-hauled through the hurricane thrashing,
With decks a-wash and with spars a-crashing, they swoop on the reeling sight.
The sea-dogs sturdy, the sea-hawks bold, that were never known to fame—
The grim adventurers, young and old, that builded our England's name—
—Over the waters of dreaming,
—Their bows are rocking and gleaming,
To the sun unsetting their flag is streaming, answering flame with flame.
The roving, roistering mariners that builded our England's name:
—Foolhardy, reckless, undaunted,
—Death they courted and taunted:
In the jaws of hell their flag they flaunted, answering flame with flame.
An endless pageant of power and pride, they steer from the long-ago
From quays that moulder beneath the tide, from cities whose walls lie low:
—Carrack and sloop and galley,
—Out of the dark they rally,
As homing birds over hill and valley, back to the land they know.
The crews of the Bristol Guinea-men, that traded to Old Calabar,
Fading for years out of English ken in sweltering seas afar;
—The Danes and the Dutch they raced there,
—The Brandenburgers they chased there,
They bid the Portingale cargoes waste there, under an evil star.
Their ships came back from the Cameroons, ragged and patched and old,
With decks roof-thatched from the Accra noons—but down in their sultry hold,
—Battened from wind and weather,
—Were coral and ostrich feather,
Jasper and ivory heaped together, amber and dust of gold.
The Greenland skippers that speared the whale at the edge of the grinding floe,
Icicles fringing sheet and sail, and decks in a smother of snow:
—Men of Clyde and of Humber,
—Cold is their Arctic slumber,
But their deeds of daring that none may number shall live while the north winds blow.
The stately captains of barque and brig, in the days of the good Queen Anne;
Under each powdered periwig was the brain of a sea-bred man.
—Was there work to be done? they did it:
—Was there danger? they pressed amid it:
Wounded to death, with a smile they hid it, and perished as sailors can.
The filibusters of Tudor years, that held the ocean in fee,
The buccaneers and the privateers, the outlawed sons of the sea:
—Terrible, swift, unsleeping,
—Like bolts from the azure leaping,
Like birds of prey on their quarry sweeping, foraging far and free.
The pigtailed bo's'ns of Anson and Cook, and the seafaring men they led—
Who has counted in song or book the roll of those glorious dead?
—On the desolate isles uncharted
—Their valorous souls departed:
They fought—they fell—and in death, blithe-hearted, cheered as the foeman fled.
The men that talked with a Devon twang, as they hoisted the sails of Drake—
All through the West their rumor rang, the pride of the Dons to break,
—Fierce to seize and to sunder
—The golden argosies' plunder,
The New World's dread and the Old World's wonder, splendid for England's sake.
The coasting-craft and the fishing-craft, lugger and ketch and hoy,
With a duck-gun fore and a blunderbuss aft, served by a man and a boy;
—Their tiny armaments flinging
—On frigate and gun-boat—bringing
Prizes and prisoners home with singing, fired with a desperate joy.
Ruffed to the chin, or laced to the knee, or stripped to the waist for fight,
Herding the alien hordes of the sea to fields of defeat and flight,
—Or, lit by the lightning's flashing,
—Close-hauled through the hurricane thrashing,
With decks a-wash and with spars a-crashing, they swoop on the reeling sight.
The sea-dogs sturdy, the sea-hawks bold, that were never known to fame—
The grim adventurers, young and old, that builded our England's name—
—Over the waters of dreaming,
—Their bows are rocking and gleaming,
To the sun unsetting their flag is streaming, answering flame with flame.