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In Cornwall and Across the Sea

With Poems Written in Devonshire. By Douglas B. W. Sladen

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WAR.

What meaneth the hum of the dockyards, the knightly old music of steel?
What meaneth the hum of the city, the tramp of the well-timed heel?
What meaneth the banner of England from the stern of the mail-ship swung?
What meaneth the note of defiance with the voice of a people flung?
War.
We hide not the sorrows of warfare, the widow, the want, and the woe;
We hide not the perils of warfare, the might of a resolute foe;
But our eyes are beginning to glitter as our fathers' flashed ages ago,
When our Edwards went forth to their battles with the men of the bill and the bow.