The Dutch In The Medway

If wars were won by feasting,
0r victory by song,
Or safety found in sleeping sound,
How England would be strong!
But honour and dominion
Are not maintained so.
They're only got by sword and shot,
And this the Dutchmen know!

The moneys that should feed us
You spend on your delight,
How can you then have sailor-men
To aid you in your fight?
Our fish and cheese are rotten,
Which makes the scurvy grow,
We cannot serve you if we starve,
And this the Dutchmen now!

Our ships in every harbour
Be neither whole nor sound,
And, when we seek to mend a leak,
No oakum can be found;
Or, if it is, the caulkers,
And carpenters also,
For lack of pay have gone away,
And this the Dutchmen know!

Mere powder, guns, and bullets,
We scarce can get at all;
Their price was spent in merriment
And revel at Whitehall,
While we in tattered doublets
From ship to ship must row,
Beseeching friends for odds and ends,
And this the Dutchmen know!

No King will heed our warnings,
No Court will pay our claims,
Our King and Court for their disport
Do sell the very Thames!
For, now De Ruyter's topsails
Off naked Chatham show,
We dare not meet him with our fleet,
And this the Dutchmen know!

Rudyard

Rudyard Kipling was an English journalist, short-story writer, poet, and novelist. He was born in British India, which inspired much of his work. His notable works include the novels 'The Jungle Book,' 'Kim,' and the poem 'If—.' Kipling was one of the most popular writers in the United Kingdom in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. He received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1907, making him the youngest recipient of the award.

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Satire On The Dutch.[1]

Written In The Year 1662.

    As needy gallants, in the scrivener's hands,
    Court the rich knaves that gripe their mortgaged lands;
    The first fat buck of all the season's sent,
    And keeper takes no fee in compliment;
    The dotage of some Englishmen is such,
    To fawn on those who ruin them--the Dutch.
    They shall have all, rather than make a war
    With those, who of the same religion are.
    The Straits, the Guinea-trade, the herrings too;
    Nay, to keep friendship, they shall pickle you.
    Some are resolved not to find out the cheat,
    But, cuckold-like, love them that do the feat.
    What injuries soe'er upon us fall,
    Yet still the same religion answers all.
    Religion wheedled us to civil war,
    Drew English blood, a...

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The Merchantmen

King Solomon drew merchantmen,
Because of his desire
For peacocks, apes, and ivory,
From Tarshish unto Tyre,
With cedars out of Lebanon
Which Hiram rafted down;
But we be only sailormen
That use in London town.

Coastwise, cross-seas, round the world and back again,
Where the flaw shall head us or the full Trade suits,
Plain-sail, storm-sail, lay your board and tack again,
And that's the way we'll pay Paddy Doyle for his boots!

We bring no store of ingots,
Of spice or precious stones,
But what we have we gathered
With sweat and aching bones:
In flame beneath the Tropics,
In frost upon the floe,
And jeopardy of every wind
That does between them go.

And some we got by purchase,
And some we had by trade,
And some we ...

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Prologue To Amboyna.[1]

    As needy gallants in the scrivener's hands,
    Court the rich knave that gripes their mortgaged lands,
    The first fat buck of all the season's sent,
    And keeper takes no fee in compliment:
    The dotage of some Englishmen is such,
    To fawn on those who ruin them--the Dutch.
    They shall have all, rather than make a war
    With those who of the same religion are.
    The Straits, the Guinea trade, the herrings too,
    Nay, to keep friendship, they shall pickle you.
    Some are resolved not to find out the cheat,
    But, cuckold-like, love him who does the feat:
    What injuries soe'er upon us fall,
    Yet, still the same religion answers all:
    Religion wheedled you to civil war,
    Drew English blood, and Dutchmen's now would spare:
 ...

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When The Great Ark

When the Great Ark, in Vigo Bay,
Rode stately through the half-manned fleet,
From every ship about her way
She heard the mariners entreat
Before we take the seas again
Let down your boats and send us men!

"We have no lack of victual here
With work God knows! enough for all,
To hand and reef and watch and steer,
Because our present strength is small.
While your three decks are crowded so
Your crews can scarcely stand or go.

"In war, your numbers do but raise
Confusion and divided will;
In storm, the mindless deep obeys
Not multitudes but single skills.
In calm, your numbers, closely pressed,
Must breed a mutiny or pest.

"We even on unchallenged seas,
Dare not adventure where we would,
But forfeit brave advantages
For l...

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Poor Honest Men

Your jar of Virginny
Will cost you a guinea,
Which you reckon too much by five shillings or ten;
But light your churchwarden
And judge it according,
When I've told you the troubles of poor honest men.

From the Capes of the Delaware,
As you are well aware,
We sail which tobacco for England-but then,
Our own British cruisers,
They watch us come through, sirs,
And they press half a score of us poor honest men!

Or if by quick sailing
(Thick weather prevailing)
We leave them behind (as we do now and then)
We are sure of a gun from
Each frigate we run from,
Which is often destruction to poor honest men!

Broadsides the Atlantic
We tumble short-handed,
With shot-holes to plug and new canvas to bend;
And off the Azores,
D...

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The Rhyme Of The Three Captains

... At the close of a winter day,
Their anchors down, by London town, the Three Great Captains lay;
And one was Admiral of the North from Solway Firth to Skye,
And one was Lord of the Wessex coast and all the lands thereby,
And one was Master of the Thames from Limehouse to Blackwall,
And he was Captain of the Fleet, the bravest of them all.
Their good guns guarded their great gray sides that were thirty foot in the sheer,
When there came a certain trading-brig with news of a privateer.
Her rigging was rough with the clotted drift that drives in a Northern breeze,
Her sides were clogged with the lazy weed that spawns in the Eastern seas.
Light she rode in the rude tide-rip, to left and right she rolled,
And the skipper sat on the scuttle-butt and stared at an empty hold.
"I ha' p...

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