e came swooping from the West.
{28}
_The Bright Medusa_
(1807)
She's the daughter of the breeze,
She's the darling of the seas,
And we call her, if you please, the bright _Medu--sa_;
From beneath her bosom bare
To the snakes among her hair
She's a flash o' golden light, the bright _Medu--sa_.
When the ensign dips above
And the guns are all for love,
She's as gentle as a dove, the bright _Medu--sa_;
But when the shot's in rack
And her forestay flies the Jack,
He's a merry man would slight the bright _Medu--sa_.
When she got the word to go
Up to Monte Video,
There she found the river low, the bright _Medu--sa_;
So she tumbled out her guns
And a hundred of her sons,
And she taught the Dons to fight the bright _Medu--sa_.
{29}
When the foeman can be found
With the pluck to cross her ground,
First she walks him round and round, the bright _Medu--sa_;
Then she rakes him fore and aft
Till he's just a jolly raft,
And she grabs him like a kite, the bright _Medu--sa_.
She's the daughter of the breeze,
She's the darling of the seas,
And you'll call her, if you please, the bright _Medu--sa_;
For till England's sun be set--
And it's not for setting yet--
She shall bear her name by right, the bright _Medu--sa_.
{30}
_The Old _Suberb__
The wind was rising easterly, the morning sky was blue,
The Straits before us opened wide and free;
We looked towards the Admiral, where high the Peter flew,
And all our hearts were dancing like the sea.
"The French are gone to Martinique with four-and-twenty sail!
The Old _Suberb_ is old and foul and slow,
But the French are gone to Martinique, and Nelson's on the trail,
And where he goes the Old _Suberb_ must go!"
_So Westward ho! for Trinidad and Eastward ho! for Spain,
And "Ship ahoy!" a hundred times a day;
Round the world if need be, and round the world again,
With a lame duck lagging all the way!_
The Old _Suberb_ was barnacled and green as grass below,
Her sticks were only fit for stirring grog;
The pride of all her midshipmen was silent long ago,
And long ago they ceased to heave the log.
{31}
Four year out from home she was, and ne'er a week in port,
And nothing save the guns aboard her bright;
But Captain Keats he knew the game, and swore to share the sport,
For he never yet
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