II

The sun was lost in a leaden sky, And the shore lay under our lee; When a great Sou’ Wester hurricane high Came rollicking up the sea.

He played with the fleet as a boy with boats Till out for the Downs we ran, And he laugh'd with the roar of a thousand throats At the militant ways of man:

Oh! I am the enemy most of might, The other be who you please! Gunner and guns may all be right, Flags a-flying and armour tight,

But I am the fellow you've first to fight — The giant that swings the seas. A dozen of middies were down below Chasing the X they love,

While the table curtseyed long and slow And the lamps were giddy above. The lesson was all of a ship and a shot, And some of it may have been true,

But the word they heard and never forgot Was the word of the wind that blew: Oh! I am the enemy most of might, The other be who you please!

Gunner and guns may all be right, Flags a-flying and armour tight, But I am the fellow you've first to fight — The giant that swings the seas.

The Middy with luck is a Captain soon, With luck he may hear one day His own big guns a-humming the tune “‘ Twas in Trafalgar's Bay.”

But wherever he goes, with friends or foes, And whatever may there befall, He'll hear for ever a voice he knows For ever defying them all:

Oh! I am the enemy most of might, The other be who you please! Gunner and guns may all be right, Flags a-flying and armour tight,

But I am the fellow you've first to fight — The giant that swings the seas.