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John Dryden - Annus Mirabilis, The Year Of Wonders, 1666
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1  
In thriving arts long time had Holland grown,
Crouching at home and cruel when abroad:
Scarce leaving us the means to claim our own;
Our King they courted, and our merchants awed.

2  
Trade, which, like blood, should circularly flow,
Stopp`d in their channels, found its freedom lost:
Thither the wealth of all the world did go,
And seem`d but shipwreck`d on so base a coast.

3  
For them alone the heavens had kindly heat;
In eastern quarries ripening precious dew:
For them the Idumaean balm did sweat,
And in hot Ceylon spicy forests grew.

4  
The sun but seem`d the labourer of the year;
Each waxing moon supplied her watery store,
To swell those tides, which from the line did bear
Their brimful vessels to the Belgian shore.

5  
Thus mighty in her ships, stood Carthage long,
And swept the riches of the world from far;
Yet stoop`d to Rome, less wealthy, but more strong:
And this may prove our second Punic war.

6  
What peace can be, where both to one pretend?
(But they more diligent, and we more strong)
Or if a peace, it soon must have an end;
For they would grow too powerful, were it long.

7  
Behold two nations, then, engaged so far
That each seven years the fit must shake each land:
Where France will side to weaken us by war,
Who only can his vast designs withstand.

8  
See how he feeds the Iberian with delays,
To render us his timely friendship vain:
And while his secret soul on Flanders preys,
He rocks the cradle of the babe of Spain.

9  
Such deep designs of empire does he lay
O`er them, whose cause he seems to take in hand;
And prudently would make them lords at sea,
To whom with ease he can give laws by land.

10 
This saw our King; and long within his breast
His pensive counsels balanced to and fro:
He grieved the land he freed should be oppress`d,
And he less for it than usurpers do.

11 
His generous mind the fair ideas drew
Of fame and honour, which in dangers lay;
Where wealth, like fruit on precipices, grew,
Not to be gather`d but by birds of prey.

12 
The loss and gain each fatally were great;
And still his subjects call`d aloud for war;
But peaceful kings, o`er martial people set,
Each, other`s poise and counterbalance are.

13 
He first survey`d the charge with careful eyes,
Which none but mighty monarchs could maintain;
Yet judged, like vapours that from limbecks rise,
It would in richer showers descend again.

14 
At length resolved to assert the watery ball,
He in himself did whole Armadoes bring:
Him aged seamen might their master call,
And choose for general, were he not their king.

15 
It seems as every ship their sovereign knows,
His awful summons they so soon obey;
So hear the scaly herd when Proteus blows,
And so to pasture follow through the sea.

16 
To see this fleet upon the ocean move,
Angels drew wide the curtains of the skies;
And heaven, as if there wanted lights above,
For tapers made two glaring comets rise.

17 
Whether they unctuous exhalations are,
Fired by the sun, or seeming so alone:
Or each some more remote and slippery star,
Which loses footing when to mortals shown.

18 
Or one, that bright companion of the sun,
Whose glorious aspect seal`d our new-born king;
And now a round of greater years begun,
New influence from his walks of light did bring.

19 
Victorious York did first with famed success,
To his known valour make the Dutch give place:
Thus Heaven our monarch`s fortune did confess,
Beginning conquest from his royal race.

20 
But since it was decreed, auspicious King,
In Britain`s right that thou shouldst wed the main,
Heaven, as a gage, would cast some precious thing,
And therefore doom`d that Lawson should be slain.

21 
Lawson amongst the foremost met his fate,
Whom sea-green Sirens from the rocks lament;
Thus as an offering for the Grecian state,
He first was kill`d who first to battle went.

22 
Their chief blown up in air, not waves, expired,
To which his pride presumed to give the law:
The Dutch confess`d Heaven present, and retired,
And all was Britain the wide ocean saw.

23 
To nearest ports their shatter`d ships repair,
Where by our dreadful cannon they lay awed:
So reverently men quit the open air,
When thunder speaks the angry gods abroad.

24 
And now approach`d their fleet from India, fraught
With all the riches of the rising sun:
And precious sand from southern climates brought,
The fatal regions where the war begun.

25 
Like hunted castors, conscious of their store,
Their waylaid wealth to Norway`s coasts they bring:
There first the north`s cold bosom spices bore,
And winter brooded on the eastern spring.

26 
By the rich scent we found our perfumed prey,
Which, flank`d with rocks, did close in covert lie;
And round about their murdering cannon lay,
At once to threaten and invite the eye.

27 
Fiercer than cannon, and than rocks more hard,
The English undertake the unequal war:
Seven ships alone, by which the port is barr`d,
Besiege the Indies, and all Denmark dare.

28 
These fight like husbands, but like lovers those:
These fain would keep, and those more fain enjoy:
And to such height their frantic passion grows,
That what both love, both hazard to destroy.

29 
Amidst whole heaps of spices lights a ball,
And now their odours arm`d against them fly:
Some preciously by shatter`d porcelain fall,
And some by aromatic splinters die.

30 
And though by tempests of the prize bereft,
In Heaven`s inclemency some ease we find:
Our foes we vanquish`d by our valour left,
And only yielded to the seas and wind.

31 
Nor wholly lost we so deserved a prey;
For storms repenting part of it restored:
Which, as a tribute from the Baltic sea,
The British ocean sent her mighty lord.

32 
Go, mortals, now; and vex yourselves in vain
For wealth, which so uncertainly must come:
When what was brought so far, and with such pain,
Was only kept to lose it nearer home.

33
The son, who twice three months on th` ocean tost,
Prepared to tell what he had pass`d before,
Now sees in English ships the Holland coast,
And parents` arms in vain stretch`d from the shore.

34 
This careful husband had been long away,
Whom his chaste wife and little children mourn;
Who on their fingers learn`d to tell the day
On which their father promised to return.

35 
Such are the proud designs of human kind,
And so we suffer shipwreck every where!
Alas, what port can such a pilot find,
Who in the night of fate must blindly steer!

36
The undistinguish`d seeds of good and ill,
Heaven, in his bosom, from our knowledge hides:
And draws them in contempt of human skill,
Which oft for friends mistaken foes provides.

37 
Let Munster`s prelate ever be accurst,
In whom we seek the German faith in vain:
Alas, that he should teach the English first,
That fraud and avarice in the Church could reign!

38 
Happy, who never trust a stranger`s will,
Whose friendship`s in his interest understood!
Since money given but tempts him to be ill,
When power is too remote to make him good.

39 
Till now, alone the mighty nations strove;
The rest, at gaze, without the lists did stand:
And threatening France, placed like a painted Jove,
Kept idle thunder in his lifted hand.

40 
That eunuch guardian of rich Holland`s trade,
Who envies us what he wants power to enjoy;
Whose noiseful valour does no foe invade,
And weak assistance will his friends destroy.

41 
Offended that we fought without his leave,
He takes this time his secret hate to show:
Which Charles does with a mind so calm receive,
As one that neither seeks nor shuns his foe.

42 
With France, to aid the Dutch, the Danes unite:
France as their tyrant, Denmark as their slave,
But when with one three nations join to fight,
They silently confess that one more brave.

43 
Lewis had chased the English from his shore;
But Charles the French as subjects does invite:
Would Heaven for each some Solomon restore,
Who, by their mercy, may decide their right!

44 
Were subjects so but only by their choice,
And not from birth did forced dominion take,
Our prince alone would have the public voice;
And all his neighbours` realms would deserts make.

45 
He without fear a dangerous war pursues,
Which without rashness he began before:
As honour made him first the danger choose,
So still he makes it good on virtue`s score.

46 
The doubled charge his subjects` love supplies,
Who, in that bounty, to themselves are kind:
So glad Egyptians see their Nilus rise,
And in his plenty their abundance find.

47 
With equal power he does two chiefs create,
Two such as each seem`d worthiest when alone;
Each able to sustain a nation`s fate,
Since both had found a greater in their own.

48 
Both great in courage, conduct, and in fame,
Yet neither envious of the other`s praise;
Their duty, faith, and interest too the same,
Like mighty partners equally they raise.

49 
The prince long time had courted fortune`s love,
But once possess`d, did absolutely reign:
Thus with their Amazons the heroes strove,
And conquer`d first those beauties they would gain.

50 
The Duke beheld, like Scipio, with disdain,
That Carthage, which he ruin`d, rise once more;
And shook aloft the fasces of the main,
To fright those slaves with what they felt before.

51 
Together to the watery camp they haste,
Whom matrons passing to their children show:
Infants` first vows for them to heaven are cast,
And future people bless them as they go.

52 
With them no riotous pomp, nor Asian train,
To infect a navy with their gaudy fears;
To make slow fights, and victories but vain:
But war severely like itself appears.

53 
Diffusive of themselves, where`er they pass,
They make that warmth in others they expect;
Their valour works like bodies on a glass,
And does its image on their men project.

54 
Our fleet divides, and straight the Dutch appear,
In number, and a famed commander, bold:
The narrow seas can scarce their navy bear,
Or crowded vessels can their soldiers hold.

55 
The Duke, less numerous, but in courage more,
On wings of all the winds to combat flies:
His murdering guns a loud defiance roar,
And bloody crosses on his flag-staffs rise.

56 
Both furl their sails, and strip them for the fight;
Their folded sheets dismiss the useless air:
The Elean plains could boast no nobler sight,
When struggling champions did their bodies bare.

57 
Borne each by other in a distant line,
The sea-built forts in dreadful order move:
So vast the noise, as if not fleets did join,
But lands unfix`d, and floating nations strove.

58 
Now pass`d, on either side they nimbly tack;
Both strive to intercept and guide the wind:
And, in its eye, more closely they come back,
To finish all the deaths they left behind.

59 
On high-raised decks the haughty Belgians ride,
Beneath whose shade our humble frigates go:
Such port the elephant bears, and so defied
By the rhinoceros, her unequal foe.

60 
And as the build, so different is the fight;
Their mounting shot is on our sails design`d:
Deep in their hulls our deadly bullets light,
And through the yielding planks a passage find.

61 
Our dreaded admiral from far they threat,
Whose batter`d rigging their whole war receives:
All bare, like some old oak which tempests beat,
He stands, and sees below his scatter`d leaves.

62 
Heroes of old, when wounded, shelter sought;
But he who meets all danger with disdain,
Even in their face his ship to anchor brought,
And steeple-high stood propt upon the main.

63 
At this excess of courage, all amazed,
The foremost of his foes awhile withdraw:
With such respect in enter`d Rome they gazed,
Who on high chairs the god-like fathers saw.

64 
And now, as where Patroclus` body lay,
Here Trojan chiefs advanced, and there the Greek
Ours o`er the Duke their pious wings display,
And theirs the noblest spoils of Britain seek.

65 
Meantime his busy mariners he hastes,
His shatter`d sails with rigging to restore;
And willing pines ascend his broken masts,
Whose lofty heads rise higher than before.

66 
Straight to the Dutch he turns his dreadful prow,
More fierce the important quarrel to decide:
Like swans, in long array his vessels show,
Whose crests advancing do the waves divide.

67 
They charge, recharge, and all along the sea
They drive, and squander the huge Belgian fleet;
Berkeley alone, who nearest danger lay,
Did a like fate with lost Creusa meet.

68 
The night comes on, we eager to pursue
The combat still, and they ashamed to leave:
Till the last streaks of dying day withdrew,
And doubtful moonlight did our rage deceive.

69 
In the English fleet each ship resounds with joy,
And loud applause of their great leader`s fame:
In fiery dreams the Dutch they still destroy,
And, slumbering, smile at the imagined flame.

70
Not so the Holland fleet, who, tired and done,
Stretch`d on their decks like weary oxen lie;
Faint sweats all down their mighty members run;
Vast bulks which little souls but ill supply.

71 
In dreams they fearful precipices tread:
Or, shipwreck`d, labour to some distant shore:
Or in dark churches walk among the dead; 
They wake with horror, and dare sleep no more.

72 
The morn they look on with unwilling eyes,
Till from their main-top joyful news they hear
Of ships, which by their mould bring new supplies,
And in their colours Belgian lions bear.

73 
Our watchful general had discern`d from far
This mighty succour, which made glad the foe:
He sigh`d, but, like a father of the war,
His face spake hope, while deep his sorrows flow.

74 
His wounded men he first sends off to shore,
Never till now unwilling to obey:
They, not their wounds, but want of strength deplore,
And think them happy who with him can stay.

75 
Then to the rest, Rejoice, said he, to-day;
In you the fortune of Great Britain lies:
Among so brave a people, you are they
Whom Heaven has chose to fight for such a prize.

76 
If number English courages could quell,
We should at first have shunn`d, not met, our foes,
Whose numerous sails the fearful only tell:
Courage from hearts and not from numbers grows.

77 
He said, nor needed more to say: with haste
To their known stations cheerfully they go;
And all at once, disdaining to be last,
Solicit every gale to meet the foe.

78
Nor did the encouraged Belgians long delay,
But bold in others, not themselves, they stood:
So thick, our navy scarce could steer their way,
But seem`d to wander in a moving wood.

79 
Our little fleet was now engaged so far,
That, like the sword-fish in the whale, they fought:
The combat only seem`d a civil war,
Till through their bowels we our passage wrought.

80 
Never had valour, no not ours, before
Done aught like this upon the land or main,
Where not to be o`ercome was to do more
Than all the conquests former kings did gain.

81 
The mighty ghosts of our great Harries rose,
And armed Edwards look`d with anxious eyes,
To see this fleet among unequal foes,
By which fate promised them their Charles should rise.

82 
Meantime the Belgians tack upon our rear,
And raking chase-guns through our sterns they send:
Close by their fire ships, like jackals appear
Who on their lions for the prey attend.

83 
Silent in smoke of cannon they come on:
Such vapours once did fiery Cacus hide:
In these the height of pleased revenge is shown,
Who burn contented by another`s side.

84 
Sometimes from fighting squadrons of each fleet,
Deceived themselves, or to preserve some friend,
Two grappling AEtnas on the ocean meet,
And English fires with Belgian flames contend.

85 Now at each tack our little fleet grows less;
And like maim`d fowl, swim lagging on the main:
Their greater loss their numbers scarce confess,
While they lose cheaper than the English gain.

86 
Have you not seen, when, whistled from the fist,
Some falcon stoops at what her eye design`d,
And, with her eagerness the quarry miss`d,
Straight flies at check, and clips it down the wind.

87 
The dastard crow that to the wood made wing,
And sees the groves no shelter can afford,
With her loud caws her craven kind does bring,
Who, safe in numbers, cuff the noble bird.

88 
Among the Dutch thus Albemarle did fare:
He could not conquer, and disdain`d to fly;
Past hope of safety, `twas his latest care,
Like falling Caesar, decently to die.

89 
Yet pity did his manly spirit move,
To see those perish who so well had fought;
And generously with his despair he strove,
Resolved to live till he their safety wrought.

90 
Let other muses write his prosperous fate,
Of conquer`d nations tell, and kings restored;
But mine shall sing of his eclipsed estate,
Which, like the sun`s, more wonders does afford.

91 
He drew his mighty frigates all before,
On which the foe his fruitless force employs:
His weak ones deep into his rear he bore
Remote from guns, as sick men from the noise.

92 
His fiery cannon did their passage guide,
And following smoke obscured them from the foe:
Thus Israel safe from the Egyptian`s pride,
By flaming pillars, and by clouds did go.

93 
Elsewhere the Belgian force we did defeat,
But here our courages did theirs subdue:
So Xenophon once led that famed retreat,
Which first the Asian empire overthrew.

94 
The foe approach`d; and one for his bold sin
Was sunk; as he that touch`d the ark was slain:
The wild waves master`d him and suck`d him in,
And smiling eddies dimpled on the main.

95 
This seen, the rest at awful distance stood:
As if they had been there as servants set
To stay, or to go on, as he thought good,
And not pursue, but wait on his retreat.

96
So Lybian huntsmen, on some sandy plain,
From shady coverts roused, the lion chase:
The kingly beast roars out with loud disdain,
And slowly moves, unknowing to give place.

97 
But if some one approach to dare his force,
He swings his tail, and swiftly turns him round;
With one paw seizes on his trembling horse,
And with the other tears him to the ground.

98 
Amidst these toils succeeds the balmy night;
Now hissing waters the quench`d guns restore;
And weary waves, withdrawing from the fight,
Lie lull`d and panting on the silent shore:

99 
The moon shone clear on the becalmed flood,
Where, while her beams like glittering silver play,
Upon the deck our careful general stood,
And deeply mused on the succeeding day.

100 
That happy sun, said he, will rise again,
Who twice victorious did our navy see:
And I alone must view him rise in vain,
Without one ray of all his star for me.

101 
Yet like an English general will I die,
And all the ocean make my spacious grave:
Women and cowards on the land may lie;
The sea`s a tomb that`s proper for the brave.

102 
Restless he pass`d the remnant of the night,
Till the fresh air proclaimed the morning nigh:
And burning ships, the martyrs of the fight,
With paler fires beheld the eastern sky.

103 
But now, his stores of ammunition spent,
His naked valour is his only guard;
Rare thunders are from his dumb cannon sent,
And solitary guns are scarcely heard.

104 
Thus far had fortune power, here forced to stay,
Nor longer durst with virtue be at strife:
This as a ransom Albemarle did pay,
For all the glories of so great a life.

105 
For now brave Rupert from afar appears,
Whose waving streamers the glad general knows:
With full spread sails his eager navy steers,
And every ship in swift proportion grows.

106 
The anxious prince had heard the cannon long,
And from that length of time dire omens drew
Of English overmatch`d, and Dutch too strong,
Who never fought three days, but to pursue.

107 
Then, as an eagle, who, with pious care
Was beating widely on the wing for prey,
To her now silent eyrie does repair,
And finds her callow infants forced away:

108 
Stung with her love, she stoops upon the plain,
The broken air loud whistling as she flies:
She stops and listens, and shoots forth again,
And guides her pinions by her young ones` cries.

109 
With such kind passion hastes the prince to fight,
And spreads his flying canvas to the sound;
Him, whom no danger, were he there, could fright,
Now absent every little noise can wound.

110 
As in a drought the thirsty creatures cry,
And gape upon the gather`d clouds for rain,
And first the martlet meets it in the sky,
And with wet wings joys all the feather`d train.

111 
With such glad hearts did our despairing men
Salute the appearance of the prince`s fleet;
And each ambitiously would claim the ken,
That with first eyes did distant safety meet.

112 
The Dutch, who came like greedy hinds before,
To reap the harvest their ripe ears did yield,
Now look like those, when rolling thunders roar,
And sheets of lightning blast the standing field.

113 
Full in the prince`s passage, hills of sand,
And dangerous flats in secret ambush lay;
Where the false tides skim o`er the cover`d land,
And seamen with dissembled depths betray.

114 
The wily Dutch, who, like fallen angels, fear`d
This new Messiah`s coming, there did wait,
And round the verge their braving vessels steer`d,
To tempt his courage with so fair a bait.

115 
But he, unmoved, contemns their idle threat,
Secure of fame whene`er he please to fight:
His cold experience tempers all his heat,
And inbred worth doth boasting valour slight.

116 
Heroic virtue did his actions guide,
And he the substance, not the appearance chose
To rescue one such friend he took more pride,
Than to destroy whole thousands of such foes.

117 
But when approach`d, in strict embraces bound,
Rupert and Albemarle together grow;
He joys to have his friend in safety found,
Which he to none but to that friend would owe.

118 
The cheerful soldiers, with new stores supplied,
Now long to execute their spleenful will;
And, in revenge for those three days they tried,
Wish one, like Joshua`s, when the sun stood still.

119 
Thus reinforced, against the adverse fleet,
Still doubling ours, brave Rupert leads the way:
With the first blushes of the morn they meet,
And bring night back upon the new-born day.

120 
His presence soon blows up the kindling fight,
And his loud guns speak thick like angry men:
It seem`d as slaughter had been breathed all night,
And Death new pointed his dull dart again.

121 
The Dutch too well his mighty conduct knew,
And matchless courage since the former fight;
Whose navy like a stiff-stretch`d cord did show,
Till he bore in and bent them into flight.

122 
The wind he shares, while half their fleet offends
His open side, and high above him shows:
Upon the rest at pleasure he descends,
And doubly harm`d he double harms bestows.

123 
Behind the general mends his weary pace,
And sullenly to his revenge he sails:
So glides some trodden serpent on the grass,
And long behind his wounded volume trails.

124 
The increasing sound is borne to either shore,
And for their stakes the throwing nations fear:
Their passions double with the cannons` roar,
And with warm wishes each man combats there.

125 
Plied thick and close as when the fight begun,
Their huge unwieldy navy wastes away;
So sicken waning moons too near the sun,
And blunt their crescents on the edge of day.

126 
And now reduced on equal terms to fight,
Their ships like wasted patrimonies show;
Where the thin scattering trees admit the light,
And shun each other`s shadows as they grow.

127 
The warlike prince had sever`d from the rest
Two giant ships, the pride of all the main;
Which with his one so vigorously he prest,
And flew so home they could not rise again.

128 
Already batter`d, by his lee they lay,
In rain upon the passing winds they call:
The passing winds through their torn canvas play,
And flagging sails on heartless sailors fall.

129 
Their open`d sides receive a gloomy light,
Dreadful as day let into shades below:
Without, grim Death rides barefaced in their sight,
And urges entering billows as they flow.

130 
When one dire shot, the last they could supply,
Close by the board the prince`s mainmast bore:
All three now helpless by each other lie,
And this offends not, and those fear no more.

131 
So have I seen some fearful hare maintain
A course, till tired before the dog she lay:
Who, stretch`d behind her, pants upon the plain,
Past power to kill, as she to get away.

132 
With his loll`d tongue he faintly licks his prey;
His warm breath blows her flix[44] up as she lies;
She trembling creeps upon the ground away,
And looks back to him with beseeching eyes.

133 
The prince unjustly does his stars accuse,
Which hinder`d him to push his fortune on;
For what they to his courage did refuse,
By mortal valour never must be done.

134 
This lucky hour the wise Batavian takes,
And warns his tatter`d fleet to follow home;
Proud to have so got off with equal stakes,
Where `twas a triumph not to be o`ercome.

135 
The general`s force, as kept alive by fight,
Now not opposed, no longer can pursue:
Lasting till heaven had done his courage right;
When he had conquer`d he his weakness knew.

136 
He casts a frown on the departing foe,
And sighs to see him quit the watery field:
His stern fix`d eyes no satisfaction show,
For all the glories which the fight did yield.

137 
Though, as when fiends did miracles avow,
He stands confess`d e`en by the boastful Dutch:
He only does his conquest disavow,
And thinks too little what they found too much.

138 
Return`d, he with the fleet resolved to stay;
No tender thoughts of home his heart divide;
Domestic joys and cares he puts away;
For realms are households which the great must guide.

139 
As those who unripe veins in mines explore,
On the rich bed again the warm turf lay,
Till time digests the yet imperfect ore,
And know it will be gold another day:

140 
So looks our monarch on this early fight,
Th` essay and rudiments of great success;
Which all-maturing time must bring to light,
While he, like Heaven, does each day`s labour bless.

141 
Heaven ended not the first or second day,
Yet each was perfect to the work design`d;
God and king`s work, when they their work survey,
A passive aptness in all subjects find.

142 
In burden`d vessels first, with speedy care,
His plenteous stores do seasoned timber send;
Thither the brawny carpenters repair,
And as the surgeons of maim`d ships attend.

143 
With cord and canvas from rich Hamburgh sent,
His navy`s molted wings he imps once more:
Tall Norway fir, their masts in battle spent,
And English oak, sprung leaks and planks restore.

144 
All hands employ`d, the royal work grows warm:
Like labouring bees on a long summer`s day,
Some sound the trumpet for the rest to swarm.
And some on bells of tasted lilies play.

145 
With gluey wax some new foundations lay
Of virgin-combs, which from the roof are hung:
Some arm`d, within doors upon duty stay,
Or tend the sick, or educate the young.

146 
So here some pick out bullets from the sides,
Some drive old oakum through each seam and rift:
Their left hand does the calking-iron guide,
The rattling mallet with the right they lift.

147 
With boiling pitch another near at hand,
From friendly Sweden brought, the seams instops:
Which well paid o`er, the salt sea waves withstand,
And shakes them from the rising beak in drops.

148 
Some the gall`d ropes with dauby marline bind,
Or sear-cloth masts with strong tarpaulin coats:
To try new shrouds one mounts into the wind,
And one below their ease or stiffness notes.

149
Our careful monarch stands in person by,
His new-cast cannons` firmness to explore:
The strength of big-corn`d powder loves to try,
And ball and cartridge sorts for every bore.

150 
Each day brings fresh supplies of arms and men,
And ships which all last winter were abroad;
And such as fitted since the fight had been,
Or, new from stocks, were fallen into the road.

151 
The goodly London in her gallant trim
(The Phoenix daughter of the vanish`d old).
Like a rich bride does to the ocean swim,
And on her shadow rides in floating gold.

152 
Her flag aloft spread ruffling to the wind,
And sanguine streamers seem the flood to fire;
The weaver, charm`d with what his loom design`d,
Goes on to sea, and knows not to retire.

153 
With roomy decks, her guns of mighty strength,
Whose low-laid mouths each mounting billow laves;
Deep in her draught, and warlike in her length,
She seems a sea-wasp flying on the waves.

154 
This martial present, piously design`d,
The loyal city give their best-loved King:
And with a bounty ample as the wind,
Built, fitted, and maintain`d, to aid him bring.

155 
By viewing Nature, Nature`s handmaid, Art,
Makes mighty things from small beginnings grow:
Thus fishes first to shipping did impart,
Their tail the rudder, and their head the prow.

156 
Some log perhaps upon the waters swam,
An useless drift, which, rudely cut within,
And, hollow`d, first a floating trough became,
And cross some rivulet passage did begin.

157 
In shipping such as this, the Irish kern,
And untaught Indian, on the stream did glide:
Ere sharp-keel`d boats to stem the flood did learn,
Or fin-like oars did spread from either side.

158 
Add but a sail, and Saturn so appear`d,
When from lost empire he to exile went,
And with the golden age to Tiber steer`d,
Where coin and commerce first he did invent.

159 
Rude as their ships was navigation then;
No useful compass or meridian known;
Coasting, they kept the land within their ken,
And knew no North but when the Pole-star shone.

160 
Of all who since have used the open sea,
Than the bold English none more fame have won:
Beyond the year, and out of heaven`s high way,
They make discoveries where they see no sun.

161 
But what so long in vain, and yet unknown,
By poor mankind`s benighted wit is sought,
Shall in this age to Britain first be shown,
And hence be to admiring nations taught.

162 
The ebbs of tides and their mysterious flow,
We, as art`s elements, shall understand,
And as by line upon the ocean go,
Whose paths shall be familiar as the land.

163 
Instructed ships shall sail to quick commerce,
By which remotest regions are allied;
Which makes one city of the universe,
Where some may gain, and all may be supplied.

164 
Then we upon our globe`s last verge shall go,
And view the ocean leaning on the sky:
From thence our rolling neighbours we shall know,
And on the lunar world securely pry.

165 
This I foretell from your auspicious care,
Who great in search of God and nature grow;
Who best your wise Creator`s praise declare,
Since best to praise his works is best to know.

166 
O truly royal! who behold the law
And rule of beings in your Maker`s mind:
And thence, like limbecks, rich ideas draw,
To fit the levell`d use of human-kind.

197 
But first the toils of war we must endure,
And from the injurious Dutch redeem the seas.
War makes the valiant of his right secure,
And gives up fraud to be chastised with ease.
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