[Editor: A poem by Percy Russell, an English author, regarding Australian support for Britain’s war in the Sudan. Published in The Manaro Mercury, 22 April 1885.]
England and Australasia.
Who said that England stood alone
Amid unnumbered foes,
Her strength decayed, her fortunes flown,
Her glory near its close?
While o’er the ocean grandly comes
The roll of the Australian drums!
The mighty mother yet has sons
Within the Austral sea,
And thro’ each heart the blood still runs
That made and keeps us free!
And Cromwell’s truth and Milton’s song
To them as unto us belong!
The sneering foreigner without,
The traitor in the pale,
May nurse the coward hope, no doubt,
That England now must fail
But Englands of each Austral sea,
Will test the Why ere that can be!
Catford, S.E.
Percy Russell.
Source:
The Manaro Mercury and Cooma and Bombala Advertiser (Cooma, NSW), 22 April 1885, p. 4
Also published in:
The West Australian (Perth, WA), 9 May 1885, p. 3
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