Collected Poems 1897 - 1907 | Page 5

Spoke as he lived and
fought, with a Captain's pride, "After you, Pilot." The pilot woke,
Down the ladder he went, and Craven died.
All men praise the deed and the manner, but we--- We set it apart from
the pride that stoops to the proud, The strength that is supple to serve
the strong and free, The grace of the empty hands and promises loud:
Sidney thirsting, a humbler need to slake, Nelson waiting his turn for
the surgeon's hand, Lucas crushed with chains for a comrade's sake,
Outram coveting right before command:
These were paladins, these were Craven's peers, These with him shall
be crowned in story and song, Crowned with the glitter of steel and the
glimmer of tears, Princes of courtesy, merciful, proud, and strong.

Messmates
He gave us all a good-bye cheerily At the first dawn of day; We
dropped him down the side full drearily When the light died away. It's a

dead dark watch that he's a-keeping there, And a long, long night that
lags a-creeping there, Where the Trades and the tides roll over him And
the great ships go by.
He's there alone with green seas rocking him For a thousand miles
round; He's there alone with dumb things mocking him, And we're
homeward bound. It's a long, lone watch that he's a-keeping there, And
a dead cold night that lags a-creeping there, While the months and the
years roll over him And the great ships go by.
I wonder if the tramps come near enough As they thrash to and fro,
And the battle-ships' bells ring clear enough To be heard down below;
If through all the lone watch that he's a-keeping there, And the long,
cold night that lags a-creeping there, The voices of the sailor-men shall
comfort him When the great ships go by.

The Death Of Admiral Blake
(August 7th, 1657)
Laden with spoil of the South, fulfilled with the glory of achievement,
And freshly crowned with never-dying fame, Sweeping by shores
where the names are the names of the victories of England, Across the
Bay the squadron homeward came.
Proudly they came, but their pride was the pomp of a funeral at
midnight, When dreader yet the lonely morrow looms; Few are the
words that are spoken, and faces are gaunt beneath the torchlight That
does but darken more the nodding plumes.
Low on the field of his fame, past hope lay the Admiral triumphant,
And fain to rest him after all his pain; Yet for the love that he bore to
his own land, ever unforgotten, He prayed to see the western hills
again.
Fainter than stars in a sky long gray with the coming of the daybreak,
Or sounds of night that fade when night is done, So in the death-dawn
faded the splendour and loud renown of warfare, And life of all its
longings kept but one.
"Oh! to be there for an hour when the shade draws in beside the
hedgerows, And falling apples wake the drowsy noon: Oh! for the hour
when the elms grow sombre and human in the twilight, And gardens
dream beneath the rising moon.
"Only to look once more on the land of the memories of childhood,

Forgetting weary winds and barren foam: Only to bid farewell to the
combe and the orchard and the moorland, And sleep at last among the
fields of home!"
So he was silently praying, till now, when his strength was ebbing
faster, The Lizard lay before them faintly blue; Now on the gleaming
horizon the white cliffs laughed along the coast-line, And now the
forelands took the shapes they knew.
There lay the Sound and the Island with green leaves down beside the
water, The town, the Hoe, the masts with sunset fired---- Dreams! ay,
dreams of the dead! for the great heart faltered on the threshold, And
darkness took the land his soul desired.

Væ Victis
Beside the placid sea that mirrored her With the old glory of dawn that
cannot die, The sleeping city began to moan and stir, As one that fain
from an ill dream would fly; Yet more she feared the daylight bringing
nigh Such dreams as know not sunrise, soon or late,--- Visions of
honour lost and power gone by, Of loyal valour betrayed by factious
hate, And craven sloth that shrank from the labour of forging fate.
They knew and knew not, this bewildered crowd, That up her streets in
silence hurrying passed, What manner of death should make their
anguish loud, What corpse across the funeral pyre be cast, For none had
spoken it; only, gathering fast As darkness gathers at noon in the sun's
eclipse, A shadow of doom enfolded them, vague and vast, And a cry
was heard, unfathered of