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To! to horse! Sir Nicholas, the clarion’s note is high!
To horse! to horse! Sir Nicholas, the big drum makes reply!
Ere this hath Lucas marched with his gallant cavaliers,And the bray of Rupert’s trumpets grows fainter in our
ears.
To horse! to horse! Sir Nicholas! White Guy is at the door,
And the raven whets his beak o’er the field of Marston Moor
Up rose the Lady Alice from her brief and broken prayer,
And she brought a silken banner down the narrow
turret-stair;
Oh! many were the tears that those radiant eyes had shed As she traced the bright word “Glory” in the gay and
glancing thread;
And mournful was the smile which o’er those lovely features ran
As she said: “It is your lady’s gift; unfurl it in the van!”
“It shall flutter, noble wench, where the best and boldes ride,
Midst the steel-clad files of Skippon, the black dragoon of Pride;
The recreant heart of Fairfax shall feel a sicklier qualm,And the rebel lips of Oliver give out a louder psalm,
When they see my lady’s gewgaw flaunt proudly on thei wing,
And hear her loyal soldiers shout ‘For God and for the King! ’”
’Tis soon. The ranks are broken, along the royal line They fly, the braggarts of the court! the bullies of th
Rhine!
Stout Langdale’s cheer is heard no more, and Astley’s helm is down,
And Rupert sheathes his rapier with a curse and with a frown,
And cold Newcastle mutters, as he follows in their flight“The German boar had better far have supped in York
to-night.”
The knight is left alone, his steel cap cleft in twain,
His good buff jerkin crimsoned o’er with many a gor stain;
Yet still he waves his banner and cries amid the rout,“For Church and King, fair gentlemen! spur on, and
fight it out
And now he wards a Roundhead’s pike, and now he
hums a stave,
And now he quotes a stage play, and now he fells a knave.God aid thee now, Sir Nicholas! thou hast no thought of fear;
God aid thee now, Sir Nicholas! for fearful odds are
here!
The rebels hem thee in, and at every cut and thrust,“Down, down,” they cry, “with Belial! down with him to
the dust!”
“I would,” quoth grim old Oliver, “that Belial’s trusty sword
This day were doing battle for the saints and for the Lord!”
The Lady Alice sits with her maidens in her bower,
The gray-haired warder watches from tie castle’s topmost tower;
“What news, what news, old Hubert?”—“The battle’s lost and won:
The royal troops are melting like mists before the sun!
And a wounded man approaches—I’m blind and cannot
see,
Yet sure I am that sturdy step my master’s step must be!”
“I’ve brought thee back thy banner, wench, from as rude and red a fray
As e’er was proof of soldier’s thew, or theme for minstrel’s lay!
Here, Hubert, bring the silver bowl and liquor quantum suff
I’ll make a shift to drain it yet, ere I part with boots and buf—
Though Guy through many a gaping wound is breathing forth his life,
And I come to thee a landless man, my fond and faithful wife
“Sweet! we will fill our mone-bags, and freight a ship for France,
And mourn in merry Paris for this poor land’s mischance;
For if the worst befall me, why better axe and rope,
Than life with Lenthall for a king, and Peters for a pope.
Alas! alas! my gallant Guy!—curse on the crop eared boor
Who sent me, with my standard, on foot from Marston
Moor!”
— WINTHROP MACKWORTH PRAED