Poems Every Child Should Know

<h3><SPAN name="Bannockburn" id="Bannockburn"></SPAN>Bannockburn.<br/><span class="subtitle">ROBERT BRUCE'S ADDRESS TO HIS ARMY.</span></h3> <div class="pre_poem"><p>You can look down on the battle-field of Bannockburn from Stirling Castle, Scotland, near which stands a magnificent statue of Robert, the Bruce. How often have I trodden over the old battle-field. The monument of William Wallace, too, looms up on the Ochil Hills, not far away. (1759-96.)</p> </div> <table class="poem" summary="poem"><tr><td><div class="stanza"> <span class="i0">Scots, wha hae wi' Wallace bled,<br/></span> <span class="i0">Scots, wham Bruce has aften led;<br/></span> <span class="i0">Welcome to your gory bed,<br/></span> <span class="i2">Or to victorie.<br/></span></div> <div class="stanza"> <span class="i0">Now's the day, and now's the hour;<br/></span> <span class="i0">See the front o' battle lower;<br/></span> <span class="i0">See approach proud Edward's power&mdash;<br/></span> <span class="i2">Chains and slaverie!<br/></span></div> <div class="stanza"> <span class="i0">Wha will be a traitor knave?<br/></span> <span class="i0">Wha can fill a coward's grave?<br/></span> <span class="i0">Wha sae base as be a slave?<br/></span> <span class="i2">Let him turn and flee!<br/></span></div> <div class="stanza"> <span class="i0">Wha for Scotland's King and law<br/></span> <span class="i0">Freedom's sword will strongly draw,<br/></span> <span class="i0">Freeman stand, or freeman fa'?<br/></span> <span class="i2">Let him follow me!<br/></span></div> <div class="stanza"> <span class="i0">By oppression's woes and pains!<br/></span> <span class="i0">By your sons in servile chains!<br/></span> <span class="i0">We will drain our dearest veins,<br/></span> <span class="i2">But they shall be free!<br/></span></div> <div class="stanza"> <span class="i0">Lay the proud usurpers low!<br/></span> <span class="i0">Tyrants fall in every foe!<br/></span> <span class="i0">Liberty's in every blow!<br/></span> <span class="i2">Let us do, or die!<br/></span></div> </td></tr></table> <p class="quotsig"><span class="smcap">Robert Burns.</span></p> <div class="chapter"> <h2><SPAN name="PART_IV" id="PART_IV"></SPAN>PART IV.<br/> <ANTIMG class="plain" src="images/part4.png" alt="A tall stalk of bluebells" title="A tall stalk of bluebells" height-obs="500" width-obs="141" style="vertical-align:middle;" /> <small>Lad and Lassie</small></h2></div> <h3><SPAN name="The_Inchcape_Rock" id="The_Inchcape_Rock"></SPAN>The Inchcape Rock.</h3> <div class="pre_poem"><p>The man is wrecked and his ship is sunken before he ever steps on board or sees the water if his heart is hard and his estimate of human beings low. "The Inchcape Rock" is a thrust at hard-heartedness. "What is the use of life?" To bear one another's burdens, to develop a genius for pulling people through hard places&mdash;that's the use of life. It is the last resort of a mean mind to crack jokes that wreck innocent voyagers on life's sea. (1774-1843.)</p> </div> <table class="poem" summary="poem"><tr><td><div class="stanza"> <span class="i0">No stir in the air, no stir in the sea,<br/></span> <span class="i0">The ship was still as she could be;<br/></span> <span class="i0">Her sails from heaven received no motion;<br/></span> <span class="i0">Her keel was steady in the ocean.<br/></span></div> <div class="stanza"> <span class="i0">Without either sign or sound of their shock,<br/></span> <span class="i0">The waves flowed over the Inchcape Rock;<br/></span> <span class="i0">So little they rose, so little they fell,<br/></span> <span class="i0">They did not move the Inchcape Bell.<br/></span></div> <div class="stanza"> <span class="i0">The Abbot of Aberbrothok<br/></span> <span class="i0">Had placed that Bell on the Inchcape Rock;<br/></span> <span class="i0">On a buoy in the storm it floated and swung,<br/></span> <span class="i0">And over the waves its warning rung.<br/></span></div> <div class="stanza"> <span class="i0">When the Rock was hid by the surge's swell,<br/></span> <span class="i0">The mariners heard the warning Bell;<br/></span> <span class="i0">And then they knew the perilous Rock,<br/></span> <span class="i0">And blest the Abbot of Aberbrothok.<br/></span></div> <div class="stanza"> <span class="i0">The sun in heaven was shining gay;<br/></span> <span class="i0">All things were joyful on that day;<br/></span> <span class="i0">The sea-birds screamed as they wheeled round,<br/></span> <span class="i0">And there was joyance in their sound.<br/></span></div> <div class="stanza"> <span class="i0">The buoy of the Inchcape Bell was seen,<br/></span> <span class="i0">A dark spot on the ocean green;<br/></span> <span class="i0">Sir Ralph the Rover walked his deck,<br/></span> <span class="i0">And he fixed his eye on the darker speck.<br/></span></div> <div class="stanza"> <span class="i0">He felt the cheering power of spring;<br/></span> <span class="i0">It made him whistle, it made him sing:<br/></span> <span class="i0">His heart was mirthful to excess,<br/></span> <span class="i0">But the Rover's mirth was wickedness.<br/></span></div> <div class="stanza"> <span class="i0">His eye was on the Inchcape float.<br/></span> <span class="i0">Quoth he, "My men, put out the boat<br/></span> <span class="i0">And row me to the Inchcape Rock,<br/></span> <span class="i0">And I'll plague the Abbot of Aberbrothok."<br/></span></div> <div class="stanza"> <span class="i0">The boat is lowered, the boatmen row,<br/></span> <span class="i0">And to the Inchcape Rock they go;<br/></span> <span class="i0">Sir Ralph bent over from the boat,<br/></span> <span class="i0">And he cut the Bell from the Inchcape float.<br/></span></div> <div class="stanza"> <span class="i0">Down sank the Bell with a gurgling sound;<br/></span> <span class="i0">The bubbles rose and burst around.<br/></span> <span class="i0">Quoth Sir Ralph, "The next who comes to the Rock<br/></span> <span class="i0">Won't bless the Abbot of Aberbrothok."<br/></span></div> <div class="stanza"> <span class="i0">Sir Ralph the Rover sailed away;<br/></span> <span class="i0">He scoured the sea for many a day;<br/></span> <span class="i0">And now grown rich with plundered store,<br/></span> <span class="i0">He steers his course for Scotland's shore.<br/></span></div> <div class="stanza"> <span class="i0">So thick a haze o'erspread the sky,<br/></span> <span class="i0">They cannot see the sun on high:<br/></span> <span class="i0">The wind hath blown a gale all day,<br/></span> <span class="i0">At evening it hath died away.<br/></span></div> <div class="stanza"> <span class="i0">On the deck the Rover takes his stand;<br/></span> <span class="i0">So dark it is they see no land.<br/></span> <span class="i0">Quoth Sir Ralph, "It will be brighter soon,<br/></span> <span class="i0">For there is the dawn of the rising moon."<br/></span></div> <div class="stanza"> <span class="i0">"Canst hear," said one, "the broken roar?<br/></span> <span class="i0">For methinks we should be near the shore."<br/></span> <span class="i0">"Now where we are I cannot tell,<br/></span> <span class="i0">But I wish I could hear the Inchcape Bell."<br/></span></div> <div class="stanza"> <span class="i0">They hear no sound; the swell is strong;<br/></span> <span class="i0">Though the wind hath fallen, they drift along<br/></span> <span class="i0">Till the vessel strikes with a shivering shock:<br/></span> <span class="i0">"O Christ! it is the Inchcape Rock!"<br/></span></div> <div class="stanza"> <span class="i0">Sir Ralph the Rover tore his hair,<br/></span> <span class="i0">He curst himself in his despair:<br/></span> <span class="i0">The waves rush in on every side,<br/></span> <span class="i0">The ship is sinking beneath the tide.<br/></span></div> <div class="stanza"> <span class="i0">But, even in his dying fear,<br/></span> <span class="i0">One dreadful sound could the Rover hear,&mdash;<br/></span> <span class="i0">A sound as if with the Inchcape Bell<br/></span> <span class="i0">The Devil below was ringing his knell.<br/></span></div> </td></tr></table> <p class="quotsig"><span class="smcap">Robert Southey.</span></p> <div style="break-after:column;"></div><br />