Sentimental reciter/The Victory

by Robert Southey

For other versions of this work, see The Victory (Southey).

THE VICTORY.

Hark! how the church bell’s thundering harmony
Stirs the glad ear! tidings of joy have come,
Good tidings of great joy! two gallant ships
Met on the element—they met, they fought
A desperate fight! good tidings of great joy!
Old England triumph’d! yet another day
Of glory for the ruler of the waves!
For those who fell, ’twas in their country’s cause,
They have their passing paragraphs of praise,
And are forgotten.

⁠There was one who died
In that day’s glory, whose obscurer name
No proud historian’s page will chronicle.
Peace to his honest soul!⁠I read his name,
’Twas in the list of slaughter, and blest God
The sound was not familiar to mine ear.
But it was told me after that this man
Was one whom lawful violence had forced
From his own home, and wife and little ones,
Who by his labour lived; that he was one
Whose uncorrupted heart could keenly feel
A husband’s love ; a father’s anxiousness;
That, from the wages of his toil, he fed
The distant dear ones, and would talk of them
At midnight when he trod the silent deck
With him he valued—talk of them, of joys
Which he had known—oh, God! and of the hour
When they should meet again, till his full heart,
His manly heart, at last would overflow
Even like a child’s with very tenderness.
Peace to his honest spirit! the ball
Of death came suddenly, and shatter’d him,
And left no moment’s agonizing thought
On those he loved so well.

⁠He ocean deep
Now lies at rest. Be Thou her comforter
Who art the widow’s friend!⁠Man does not know
What a cold sickness made her blood run back,
When first she heard the tidings of the fight;
Man does not know with what a dreadful hope
She listen’d to the names of those who died;
Man does not know, or knowing, will not heed,
With what an agony of tenderness
She gazed upon her children, and beheld
His image who was gone.⁠Oh, God! be thou
Who art the widow’s friend, her comforter!

⁠Southey.