Up the well-remembered fairway, past the buoys and forts we drifted —
Saw the houses, roads, and churches as they were a year ago.
Far astern were wars and battles, all the dreary clouds were lifted,
As we turned the Elbow Ledges — felt the engines ease to “Slow.”
Rusty side and dingy paintwork, stripped for war and cleared for battle —
Saw the harbour-tugs around us — smelt the English fields again,—
English fields and English hedges — sheep and horses, English cattle,
Like a screen unrolled before us, through the mist of English rain.
Slowly through the basin entrance — twenty thousand tons a-crawling
With a thousand men aboard her, all a-weary of the War —
Warped her round and laid alongside with the cobble-stones a-calling —
“There's a special train awaiting, just for you to come ashore.”
Out again as fell the evening, down the harbour in the gloaming
With the sailors on the fo'c' sle looking wistfully a-lee —
Just another year of waiting — just another year of roaming
For the Majesty of England — for the Freedom of the Sea.