From The Monthly Review, 1831, page 385
Prayer at Sea after Victory
'Through evening's bright repose
A voice of prayer arose,
When the sea-fight was done;
The sons of England knelt,
With hearts that now could melt,
'Round their tall ship, the main
Heaved with a dark red stain
Caught not from sunset's cloud;
While with the tide swept past
Pennon and shivered mast,
'But free and fair on high,
A native of the sky,
Her streamer met the breeze;
It flowed o'er fearless men,
Though hushed and child-like then,
'Oh I did not thought of home
O'er each bold spirit come,
As from the land, sweet gales?
In every word of prayer,
Had not some hearth a share
'Yes! bright green spots that lay
In beauty far away,
Hearing no billow's roar;
Safer from touch of spoil,
For that day's fiery toil,
'A solemn scene, and dread:
The victors and the dead—
The breathless, burning sky!
And, passing with the race
Of waves that keep no trace,
'A stern, yet holy scene!
Billows, where strife hath been,
Sinking to awful sleep;
And words that breathe the sense
Of God's omnipotence,
'Borne through such hours afar,
Thy flag hath been a star
Where eagle's wing ne'er flew;
England the unprofaned,
Thou of the homes unstained!
The Winter's Wreath, pp. 53, 54.