Rudyard Kipling (1865–1936). Verse: 1885–1918. 1922.
The Ballad of the “Clampherdown”
I
Would sweep the Channel clean,
Wherefore she kept her hatches close
When the merry Channel chops arose,
To save the bleached Marine.
And a great stern-gun beside.
They dipped their noses deep in the sea,
They racked their stays and stanchions free
In the wash of the wind-whipped tide.
Fell in with a cruiser light
That carried the dainty Hotchkiss gun
And a pair of heels wherewith to run
From the grip of a close-fought fight.
As ye shoot at a bobbing cork—
And once she fired and twice she fired,
Till the bow-gun drooped like a lily tired
That lolls upon the stalk.
“The deck-beams break below,
“’Twere well to rest for an hour or twain,
“And botch the shattered plates again.”
And he answered, “Make it so.”
As you shoot at the flying duck—
And the great stern-gun shot fair and true,
With the heave of the ship, to the stainless blue,
And the great stern-turret stuck.
“The feed-pipes burst below—
“You can hear the hiss of the helpless ram,
“You can hear the twisted runners jam.”
And he answered, “Turn and go!”
And grimly did she roll;
Swung round to take the cruiser’s fire
As the White Whale faces the Thresher’s ire
When they war by the frozen Pole.
“And faster still fall we;
“And it is not meet for English stock
“To bide in the heart of an eight-day clock
“The death they cannot see.”
“We drift upon her beam;
“We dare not ram, for she can run:
“And dare ye fire another gun,
“And die in the peeling steam?”
That carried an armour-belt;
But fifty feet at stern and bow
Lay bare as the paunch of the purser’s sow,
To the hail of the Nordenfeldt.
“The chilled steel bolts are swift!
“We have emptied the bunkers in open sea,
“Their shrapnel bursts where our coal should be.”
And he answered, “Let her drift.”
Swung round upon the tide,
Her two dumb guns glared south and north,
And the blood and the bubbling steam ran forth,
And she ground the cruiser’s side.
“They bid you send your sword.”
And he answered, “Grapple her stern and bow.
“They have asked for the steel. They shall have it now;
“Out cutlasses and board!”
Spewed up four hundred men;
And the scalded stokers yelped delight,
As they rolled in the waist and heard the fight,
Stamp o’er their steel-walled pen.
From conning-tower to hold.
They fought as they fought in Nelson’s fleet;
They were stripped to the waist, they were bare to the feet,
As it was in the days of old.
Heaved up her battered side—
And carried a million pounds in steel,
To the cod and the corpse-fed conger-eel,
And the scour of the Channel tide.
Stood out to sweep the sea,
On a cruiser won from an ancient foe,
As it was in the days of long ago,
And as it still shall be!