A Satyr on the Sea-Officers

With Monmouth cap, and cutlace by my side,
Striding at least a yard at every stride,
I'm come to tell you, after much petition,
The Admiralty has given me a commission :
And now with Bully Tourville I'll ingage,
And try my fortune on a floating stage.
What blustring tarr at this dares take offence,
While I stand thus to prove my just pretence?
Will he pretend to fight better than I ?
Ad's death I'd tell him, ' Damn you, sir, you lye,'
And then I'd ask him how they fought at Rye.
Your Bantry business too was but a fetch,
Where you call'd running, battering at a stretch;
But you'll reply your leaders were to blame,
While I condemn you all to bear the shame.
For who the Divel e'er refus'd his meat
Because another had no mind to eat ?
The Dutch were drunk, you barbarously say.
Pray, next, do you be drunk too, so you stay,
For 'twas your sober fighting lost the day.
Old Albemarle wou'd say that men of war
In navy stunk not half enough of tarr.
Your o'ergrown pages and attorney's clerks
To fight and govern fleets are proper sparks.
Then let the spruce land-pirats be content
To swagger in their native element,
And let tarpawlings rule by my consent:
For things now look as if men took commission
To damn all discipline and sow sedition,
And fighting was the least of their ambition;
No matter who comes home with broken bones,
So you but come to touch the patacoons.
The pitch of honour is desire of money ;
That paltry, coward vice has quite undone ye.
You court preferment on no other score
But to be poorly rich, or basely poor:
For who would not propose a trip to Spain
That has within his prospect double gain,
To line his pockets, and to save his skin ?
For none must fight with merchants' money in.
Your heads run round with Mexico and Sevil;
I wish this shipping plate was at the Devil.
Wou'd the good King had but a just relation,
What infamy, what sums 't has cost the nation !
He'd quickly damn your trade of importation,
And add it to the Act of Navigation.
'But how then shall we live?' ye murm'rers say.
'S life ! can't you be content with double pay ?
Shew us your twofold merit, sirs, I pray.
Some has got two commands by land and sea,
While one might safely swear, might one be free,
They're neither flesh nor fish, nor good red herring,
'Those are your coll'nels, captains with a murrain.
Boldly to those two elements y'aspire,
But at an awful distance then you fire.
A few there are, and they are very few,
To whom a fairer character is due.
Time was when captains went on there own errands,
And in their pockets carried their press warrants;
Now you imploy the villains of the fleet,
While you date from the Downs in Bedford Street.
But times are alter'd ; 'tis not now as then,
For now you press the money, spare the men.
Those plain, dull fellows no such secrets found
To make press warrants worth a hundred pound.
It is our fate, our frailty, or disease,
To trust our honour in such hands as these:
Raw in their trade, their principles not right,
With hearts too tender, and with heads too light,
Too weak for council, and too nice to fight.
Their bodies are not made of battering-stuff,
Their cracknel carcasses not splinter-proof;
And yet will fairly tell a sailor's tale,
But must attempt it in a coat of mail.
Some swaggering bully snaps me short, and swears,
'Damn me, these fellows wou'd be kick'd downstairs !'
Sir, by your leave, do you but fight at sea,
And then kick down the Monument for me.
The Parliament may plague us with taxation,
But till they cure the grievance of the nation,
Monsieur will make the narrow seas his station.
Then what becomes of all our ancient rule,
Our right from Edgar, and command from Thule ?
Believe me, sirs, it will be then confest,
Your flag a dishclout, and your claim a jest.
The hardy duke we mention'd, whose great name
Stretch'd the blown cheeks of trumpet-sounding fame,
Once boldly try'd what English men could do ;
But such examples who dare now pursue ?
A four daies' fight he gloriously maintain'd,
And what he lost in blood in honour gain'd;
To keep that spotless he the ocean stain'd.
Each day he tack'd, and fought from sun to sun,
Against the odds at least of two for one;
Had ye been there, sirs, what wou'd ye have done?
He ne'er stood ' Shall I, shall I keep a loof ?'-
But fought as if his skin was cannon-proof;
Then all that can be said to do you right,
You'll keep a wind as long as he did fight.