 | Poems and Plays |  |
104
The steady pikemen of the savage band,
Waiting our hasty charge, in order stand;
But when th' advancing Spaniard aim'd his stroke,
Their ranks, to form a hollow square, they broke;
An easy passage to our troop they leave,
And deep within their lines their foes receive;
Their files resuming then the ground they gave,
Bury the Christians in that closing grave.
Waiting our hasty charge, in order stand;
But when th' advancing Spaniard aim'd his stroke,
Their ranks, to form a hollow square, they broke;
An easy passage to our troop they leave,
And deep within their lines their foes receive;
Their files resuming then the ground they gave,
Bury the Christians in that closing grave.
105
As the keen Crocodile, who loves to lay
His silent ambush for his finny prey,
Hearing the scaly tribe with sportive sound
Advance, and cast a muddy darkness round,
Opens his mighty mouth, with caution, wide,
And, when th' unwary fish within it glide,
Closing with eager haste his hollow jaw,
Thus satiates with their lives his rav'nous maw:
So, in their toils, without one warning thought,
The murd'rous foe our little squadron caught
With quick destruction, in a fatal strife,
From whence no Christian soldier 'scap'd with life.
His silent ambush for his finny prey,
Hearing the scaly tribe with sportive sound
Advance, and cast a muddy darkness round,
Opens his mighty mouth, with caution, wide,
And, when th' unwary fish within it glide,
Closing with eager haste his hollow jaw,
Thus satiates with their lives his rav'nous maw:
So, in their toils, without one warning thought,
The murd'rous foe our little squadron caught
With quick destruction, in a fatal strife,
From whence no Christian soldier 'scap'd with life.
| Poems and Plays | |