ROBERT BLAKE,
ADMIRAL AND GENERAL OF THE PARLIAMENTARY FORCES.
What! will they sweep the channels,
And brave us as they go!
There’s no place in English annals
For the triumph of a foe.
Thus spoke the English admiral,
His hand was on his sword;
Hurrah! was the sole answer
From every man on board.
The Dutch came o’er the ocean,
As if it were their home,
With a slow and gliding motion
The stately vessels come.
The sky is blue above them,
But ere an hour be past,
The shadows of the battle
Will over heaven be cast
They meet—it is in thunder,
The thunder of the gun;
Fire rends the smoke asunder,
The battle is begun.
He stands amid his seamen,
Our Admiral of the White,
And guides the strife more calmly,
Than of that strife I write.
For over the salt water
The grape-shot sweeps around;
The decks are red with slaughter,
The dead are falling round.
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