“Lie down, lie down, my bold A.B.,
      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?”

    It was our war-ship Clampherdown
      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.

   “Captain, they lack us through and through;
      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.”

    It was our war-ship Clampherdown,
      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.

   “Captain, they cry the fight is done,
      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!”

    It was our war-ship Clampherdown,
      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.

    They cleared the cruiser end to end,
      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.

    It was the sinking Clampherdown
      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.

    It was the crew of the Clampherdown
      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.

RUDYARD KIPLING.

 THE DESTRUCTION OF SENNACHERIB.

“The Destruction of Sennacherib,” by Lord Byron, finds a place in this collection because Johnnie, a ten-year-old, and many of his friends say, “It’s great.” (1788-1824.)

    The Assyrian came down like a wolf on the fold,
    And his cohorts were gleaming in purple and gold;
    And the sheen of their spears was like stars on the sea,
    When the blue wave rolls nightly on deep Galilee.

    Like the leaves of the forest when the Summer is green,
    That host with their banners at sunset were seen: 
    Like the leaves of the forest when Autumn hath blown,
    That host on the morrow lay withered and strown.

    For the Angel of Death spread his wings on the blast,
    And breathed in the face of the foe as he passed;
    And the eyes of the sleepers waxed deadly and chill,
    And their hearts but once heaved, and forever grew still!