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(CIVIL WARS, 1642)
NAKED and grey the Cotswolds stand | |
| Beneath the autumn sun, | |
| And the stubble-fields on either hand | |
| Where Stour and Avon run. | |
| There is no change in the patient land | 5 |
| That has bred us every one. | |
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| She should have passed in cloud and fire | |
| And saved us from this sin | |
| Of war—red war—’twixt child and sire, | |
| Household and kith and kin, | 10 |
| In the heart of a sleepy Midland shire, | |
| With the harvest scarcely in. | |
| |
| But there is no change as we meet at last | |
| On the brow-head or the plain, | |
| And the raw astonished ranks stand fast | 15 |
| To slay or to be slain | |
| By the men they knew in the kindly past | |
| That shall never come again— | |
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| By the men they met at dance or chase, | |
| In the tavern or the hall, | 20 |
| At the justice-bench and the market-place, | |
| At the cudgel-play or brawl— | |
| Of their own blood and speech and race, | |
| Comrades or neighbours all! | |
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| More bitter than death this day must prove | 25 |
| Whichever way it go, | |
| For the brothers of the maids we love | |
| Make ready to lay low | |
| Their sisters’ sweethearts, as we move | |
| Against our dearest foe. | 30 |
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| Thank Heaven! At last the trumpets peal | |
| Before our strength gives way. | |
| For King or for the Commonweal | |
| No matter which they say, | |
| The first dry rattle of new-drawn steel | 35 |
| Changes the world to-day! | |
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