And the gunner said: "Ay, ay," but the seamen made reply: "We have children, we have wives, And the Lord hath spared our lives. We will make the Spaniard promise, if we yield, to let us go; We shall live to fight again, and to strike another blow." And the lion there lay dying, and they yielded to the foe. And the stately Spanish men to their flagship bore him then, Where they laid him by the mast, old Sir Richard caught at last. And they praised him to his face with their courtly foreign grace; But he rose upon their decks, and he cried: "I have fought for Queen and Faith, like a valiant man and true; I have only done my duty, as a man is bound to do; With a joyful spirit, I, Sir Richard Grenville, die!" And he fell upon their decks, and he died. And they stared at the dead that had been so valiant and true, And had holden the power and glory of Spain so cheap, That he dared her with one little ship and his English few; Was he devil or man? He was devil for aught they knew, But they sank his body with honor down into the deep, And they mann'd the "Revenge" with a swarthier alien crew, And away she sail'd with her loss, and long'd for her own; When a wind from the lands they had ruin'd awoke from sleep, And the water began to heave, and the weather to moan, And or ever that evening ended a great gale blew, And a wave like the wave that is raised by an earthquake grew, Till it smote on their hulls and their sails and their masts and their flags, And the whole sea plunged and fell on the shot-shatter'd navy of Spain, And the little "Revenge" herself went down by the island crags, To be lost evermore in the main. THE RIDER OF THE BLACK HORSE GEORGE LIPPARD It was the 7th of October, 1777. Horatio Gates stood before his tent, gazing steadfastly upon the two armies now arrayed in order of battle. It was a clear, bracing day, mellow with the richness of autumn. The sky was cloudless, the foliage of the wood scarce tinged with purple and gold, the buckwheat in yonder fields frostened into snowy ripeness. But the tread of legions shook the ground, from every bush shot the glimmer of the rifle barrel, on every hillside blazed the sharpened bayonet. Gates was sad and thoughtful, as he watched the evolutions of the two armies. But all at once a smoke arose, a thunder shook the ground and a chorus of shouts and groans yelled along the darkened air. The play of death had begun. The two flags, this of the stars, that of the red cross, tossed amid the smoke of battle, while the sky was clouded with leaden folds, and the earth throbbed with the pulsations of a mighty heart.