Dawn broke in England, sweet and clear;
Birds in the brake, the lark in heaven
Made musical the morning air;
But distant, shattered, scorched and riven,
Gathered the ships—aye, dawn was well
After the night's dark, raging hell.
But some came not with break of light,
Nor looked upon the saffron dawn;
They keep the watch of endless Night,
On the soft breast of ocean borne.
O waking England, rise and pray
For sons who guard thee night and day!
Scapa Flow, May, 1916.
CAPTAINS adventurous, from your ports of quiet,
From the ghostly harbours, where your sea-beat galleons lie,
Say, do your dreams go back across the sea-line
Where cliffs of England rise grey against the sky?
Say, do you dream of the pleasant ports of old-time—
Orchards of old Devon, all afoam with snowy bloom?
Or have the mists that veil the Sea of Shadows
Closed from your eyes all the memories of home?
Feet of the Captains hurry through the stillness,
Ghostly sails of galleons are drifting to and fro,
Voices of mariners sound across the shadows,
Waiting the word that shall bid them up and go.
"Lo, now," they say, "for the grey old Mother calls us,"
(Listening to the thunder of the guns about her shore,)
"Death shall not hold us, nor years that lie between us,
Sail we to England to strike for her once more."