Right on our flank the sun
was dropping down;
The deep sea heaved
around in bright repose;
When, like the wild shriek
from some captured town,
A
cry of women rose.
The stout ship Birkenhead
lay hard and fast,
Caught without
hope upon a hidden rock;
Her timbers thrilled as nerves,
when thro’ them passed
The
spirit of that shock.
And ever like base cowards,
who leave their ranks
In danger’s
hour, before the rush of steel,
Drifted away, disorderly,
the planks
From
underneath her keel.
So calm the air—so
calm and still the flood,
That low down
in its blue translucent glass
We saw the great fierce fish,
that thirst for blood,
Pass
slowly, then repass.
They tarried, the waves tarried,
for their prey!
The sea turned
one clear smile! Like things asleep
Those dark shapes in the azure
silence lay,
As
quiet as the deep.
Then amidst oath, and prayer,
and rush, and wreck,
Faint screams,
faint questions waiting no reply,
Our Colonel gave the word,
and on the deck
Form’d
us in line to die.
To die!—’twas
hard, while the sleek ocean glow’d
Beneath a sky
as fair as summer flowers:
“All to the Boats!”
cried one—he was, thank God,
No
officer of ours.
Our English hearts beat true—we
would not stir:
That base appeal
we heard, but heeded not:
On land, on sea, we had our
Colours, sir,
To
keep without a spot.
They shall not say in England,
that we fought
With shameful
strength, unhonour’d life to seek;
Into mean safety, mean deserters,
brought
By
trampling down the weak.
So we made the women with
their children go,
The oars ply back
again, and yet again;
Whilst, inch by inch, the
drowning ship sank low,
Still,
under steadfast men.
——What follows,
why recall?—The brave who died,
Died without flinching
in the bloody surf,
They sleep as well beneath
that purple tide
As
others under turf.
They sleep as well! and, roused
from their wild grave,
Wearing their
wounds like stars, shall rise again,
Joint heirs with Christ, because
they bled to save
His
weak ones, not in vain.
If that day’s work no
clasp or medal mark,
If each proud
heart no cross of bronze may press,
Nor cannon thunder loud from
Tower or Park,
This
feel we none the less:
That those whom God’s
high grace there saved from ill,
Those also left
His martyrs in the bay,
Though not by siege, though
not in battle, still
Full
well had earned their pay.