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(NAPOLEONIC)
THE BOATS of Newhaven and Folkestone and Dover | |
| To Dieppe and Boulogne and to Calais cross over; | |
| And in each of those runs there is not a square yard | |
| Where the English and French haven’t fought and fought hard! | |
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| If the ships that were sunk could be floated once more, | 5 |
| They’d stretch like a raft from the shore to the shore, | |
| And we’d see, as we crossed, every pattern and plan | |
| Of ship that was built since sea-fighting began. | |
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| There’d be biremes and brigantines, cutters and sloops, | |
| Cogs, carracks and galleons with gay gilded poops— | 10 |
| Hoys, caravels, ketches, corvettes and the rest, | |
| As thick as regattas, from Ramsgate to Brest. | |
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| But the galleys of Cæsar, the squadrons of Sluys, | |
| And Nelson’s crack frigates are hid from our eyes, | |
| Where the high Seventy-fours of Napoleon’s days | 15 |
| Lie down with Deal luggers and French chasse-marées. | |
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| They’ll answer no signal—they rest on the ooze, | |
| With their honey-combed guns and their skeleton crews— | |
| And racing above them, through sunshine or gale, | |
| The Cross-Channel packets come in with the Mail. | 20 |
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| Then the poor sea-sick passengers, English and French, | |
| Must open their trunks on the Custom-house bench, | |
| While the officers rummage for smuggled cigars | |
| And nobody thinks of our blood-thirsty wars! | |
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