Ye Mariners of England

E NGLAND has always been called "Mistress of the Seas," a title well deserved because of her great sailors. In times of war her safety is usually entrusted to the fleets that guard the North Sea, the Channel, and the Irish coasts. The great strength of the English navy has always served to prevent enemies from landing on her shores, and it was this strength that prevented Napoleon from invading the British Isles at the time when he had overcome every other nation in Europe.

This poem of Thomas Campbell is a call to the English sailors to prove themselves worthy of their great sea-fighters of the past. He names Admiral Blake, who fought and defeated the Dutch and the Spanish navies in the seventeenth century, and Lord Nelson, the great admiral of Napoleon's time. Nelson defeated Napoleon's navy at the battle of the Nile and the battle of Trafalgar. The latter battle was fought in 1805 against the French and Spanish fleets combined, and made England supreme on the sea. At the beginning of the engagement Nelson flew the signal "England expects every man to do his duty." He himself was mortally wounded.

In the last stanza Campbell speaks of "the meteor flag of England," using that simile because of the exceedingly brilliant red of the English ensign.

Ye Mariners of England

by Thomas Campbell