And for myself (quoth he),This my full rest shall be, England ne'er mourn for me, Nor more esteem me ;Victor I will remain, Or on this earth lie slain: Never shall she sustain Loss to redeem me. Poitiers and Cressy tell, No less our skill is Lopp'd the French lilies. The Duke of York so dread On the false Frenchmen! They now to fight are gone: Armour on armour shone, Drum now to drum did groan— To hear was wonder; That with the cries they make, The very earth did shake; Trumpet to trumpet spakeThunder to thunder. Well it thine age became, O noble Erpingham! Which didst the signal aim To our hid forces, When from a meadow by, Stuck the French horses. With Spanish yew so strong, Piercing the weather,— When down their bows they threw, And forth their bilboes drew, Not one was tardy; Our men were hardy. This while our noble king, His broadsword brandishing, Into the host did fling, As to o'erwhelm it, And many a deep wound lent, His arms with blood besprent, And many a cruel dent Bruized his helmet. Gloster, that duke so good, With his brave brother; Clarence, in steel so bright, Though but a maiden knight Yet in that furious fight Scarce such another. YE MARINERS OF ENGLAND A NAVAL ODE I YE Mariners of England! That guard our native seas; Whose flag has braved, a thousand years, The battle and the breeze! Your glorious standard launch again To meet another foe! And sweep through the deep, While the stormy tempests blow; While the battle rages loud and long, And the stormy tempests blow. I The spirits of your fathers Shall start from every wave!— For the deck it was their field of fame, Where Blake and mighty Nelson fell, While the battle rages loud and long, III Britannia needs no bulwark, No towers along the steep; Her march is o'er the mountain-waves, Her home is on the deep. With thunders from her native oak She quells the floods below, As they roar on the shore, When the stormy tempests blow; And the stormy tempests blow, |