The Victory

Hark--how the church-bells thundering harmony
  Stuns 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 triumphed! 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
  That 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! suddenly
  It came, and merciful the ball of death,
  For it came suddenly and shattered 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 listened 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
  Her comforter who art the widow's friend!