Pirates' Song.

("Nous emmenions en esclavage.")

[VIII., March, 1828.]


We're bearing fivescore Christian dogs
To serve the cruel drivers:
Some are fair beauties gently born,
And some rough coral-divers.
We hardy skimmers of the sea
Are lucky in each sally,
And, eighty strong, we send along
The dreaded Pirate Galley.

A nunnery was spied ashore,
We lowered away the cutter,
And, landing, seized the youngest nun
Ere she a cry could utter;
Beside the creek, deaf to our oars,
She slumbered in green alley,
As, eighty strong, we sent along
The dreaded Pirate Galley.

"Be silent, darling, you must come -
The wind is off shore blowing;
You only change your prison dull
For one that's splendid, glowing!
His Highness doats on milky cheeks,
So do not make us dally" -
We, eighty strong, who send along
The dreaded Pirate Galley.

She sought to flee back to her cell,
And called us each a devil!
We dare do aught becomes Old Scratch,
But like a treatment civil,
So, spite of buffet, prayers, and calls -
Too late her friends to rally -
We, eighty strong, bore her along
Unto the Pirate Galley.

The fairer for her tears profuse,
As dews refresh the flower,
She is well worth three purses full,
And will adorn the bower -
For vain her vow to pine and die
Thus torn from her dear valley:
She reigns, and we still row along
The dreaded Pirate Galley.

Victor-Marie Hugo

Victor-Marie Hugo was a French poet, novelist, and dramatist of the Romantic movement. He is considered one of the greatest French writers, with works such as "Les Misérables" and "The Hunchback of Notre-Dame." His literary works often explore themes of justice, love, and human rights. In addition to his literary achievements, he was also a politician and human rights activist. Hugo's influence extends beyond literature into politics and society.

Victor-Marie Hugo

Cornflowers.

Victor-Marie Hugo, Simple Poetry

The Fay And The Peri.

Victor-Marie Hugo, Simple Poetry

The Blinded Bourbons.

Victor-Marie Hugo, Simple Poetry

The Pasha And The Dervish.

Victor-Marie Hugo, Simple Poetry

English

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Sea-Adventurers' Song.

("En partant du Golfe d'Otrante.")

[Bk. XXVIII.]


We told thirty when we started
From port so taut and fine,
But soon our crew were parted,
Till now we number nine.

Tom Robbins, English, tall and straight,
Left us at Aetna light;
He left us to investigate
What made the mountain bright;
"I mean to ask Old Nick himself,
(And here his eye he rolls)
If I can't bring Newcastle pelf
By selling him some coals!"

In Calabree, a lass and cup
Drove scowling Spada wild:
She only held her finger up,
And there he drank and smiled;
And over in Gaëta Bay,
Ascanio - ashore
A fool! - must wed a widow gay
Who'd buried three or four.

At Naples, woe! poor Ned they hanged -
Hemp neckcloth he disdained -

Victor-Marie Hugo

The Darned Mounseer.

I shipped, d'ye see, in a Revenue sloop,
And, off Cape Finistere,
A merchantman we see,
A Frenchman, going free,
So we made for the bold Mounseer.
D'ye see?
We made for the bold Mounseer!
But she proved to be a Frigate and she up with her ports,
And fires with a thirty-two!
It come uncommon near,
But we answered with a cheer,
Which paralyzed the Parley-voo,
D'ye see?
Which paralyzed the Parley-voo!

Then our Captain he up and he says, says he,
"That chap we need not fear,
We can take her, if we like,
She is sartin for to strike,
For she's only a darned Mounseer,
D'ye see?
She's only a darned Mounseer!
But to fight a French fal-lal it's like hittin' of a gal
It's a lubberly thing for to do;
For we, with all our faults,

William Schwenck Gilbert

Treasure Trove

We were a crew of what you please,
Men with the lust of gold gone mad;
Dutch and Yankee and Portuguese,
With a nigger or two from Trinidad,
The scum of the Caribbees:
Outbound, outbound for a treasure ground,
A pirate isle no man had found,
A long-lost isle in the Southern Seas,
An isle of the Southern Seas.

We sailed our ship by a chart we bore,
The parchment script of a buccaneer,
Whose skeleton, found on a Carib shore,
Had kept its secret for many a year,
Locked in a buckle of belt it wore.
And the dim chart told of buried gold,
A hidden harbor and pirate hold,
On an isle that seamen touched no more,
That sailors knew no more.

We were a crew of Devil-may-care,
Who staked our lives on a bit of a scrawl;
Who diced each other fo...

Madison Julius Cawein

The Pirates In England

When Rome was rotten-ripe to her fall,
And the sceptre passed from her hand,
The pestilent Picts leaped over the wall ,
To harry the English land.

The little dark men of the mountain and waste,
So quick to laughter and tears,
They came panting with hate and haste
For the loot of five hundred years.

They killed the trader, they sacked the shops,
They ruined temple and town,
They swept like wolves through the standing crops
Crying that Rome was down.

They wiped out all that they could find
Of beauty and strength and worth,
But they could not wipe out the Vikings Wind,
That brings the ships from the North.

They could not wipe out the North-East gales,
Nor what those gales set free,
The pirate ships with their close-reefed sails,...

Rudyard

Jersey.

("Jersey dort dans les flots.")

[Bk. III. xiv., Oct. 8, 1854.]


Dear Jersey! jewel jubilant and green,
'Midst surge that splits steel ships, but sings to thee!
Thou fav'rest Frenchmen, though from England seen,
Oft tearful to that mistress "North Countree";
Returned the third time safely here to be,
I bless my bold Gibraltar of the Free.

Yon lighthouse stands forth like a fervent friend,
One who our tempest buffets back with zest,
And with twin-steeple, eke our helmsman's end,
Forms arms that beckon us upon thy breast;
Rose-posied pillow, crystallized with spray,
Where pools pellucid mirror sunny ray.

A frigate fretting yonder smoothest sky,
Like pauseless petrel poising o'er a wreck,
Strikes bright athwart the dearly dazzle...

Victor-Marie Hugo

The Pirates In England

When Rome was rotten-ripe to her fall,
And the sceptre passed from her hand,
The pestilent Picts leaped over the wall
To harry the English land.

The little dark men of the mountain and waste,
So quick to laughter and tears,
They came panting with hate and haste
For the loot of five hundred years.

They killed the trader, they sacked the shops,
They ruined temple and town,
They swept like wolves through the standing crops
Crying that Rome was down.

They wiped out all that they could find
Of beauty and strength and worth,
But they could not wipe out the Viking's Wind
That brings the ships from the North.

They could not wipe out the North-East gales
Nor what those gales set free,
The pirate ships with their close-reefed sails,

Rudyard