10 Best Famous Rovers Poems

Here is a collection of the top 10 all-time best famous Rovers poems. This is a select list of the best famous Rovers poetry. Reading, writing, and enjoying famous Rovers poetry (as well as classical and contemporary poems) is a great past time. These top poems are the best examples of rovers poems.

• All Famous Rovers Poems

 This ballad appears to refer to one of the exploits of the notorious
Paul Jones, the American pirate. It is founded on fact.


 . . . At the close of a winter day,
Their anchors down, by London town, the Three Great Captains lay;
And one was Admiral of the North from Solway Firth to Skye,
And one was Lord of the Wessex coast and all the lands thereby,
And one was Master of the Thames from Limehouse to Blackwall,
And he was Captain of the Fleet -- the bravest of them all.
Their good guns guarded their great gray sides that were thirty foot in the sheer,
When there came a certain trading-brig with news of a privateer.
Her rigging was rough with the clotted drift that drives in a Northern breeze,
Her sides were clogged with the lazy weed that spawns in the Eastern seas.
Light she rode in the rude tide-rip, to left and right she rolled,
And the skipper sat on the scuttle-butt and stared at an empty hold.
"I ha' paid Port dues for your Law," quoth he, "and where is the Law ye boast
If I sail unscathed from a heathen port to be robbed on a Christian coast?
Ye have smoked the hives of the Laccadives as we burn the lice in a bunk,
We tack not now to a Gallang prow or a plunging Pei-ho junk;
I had no fear but the seas were clear as far as a sail might fare
Till I met with a lime-washed Yankee brig that rode off Finisterre.
There were canvas blinds to his bow-gun ports to screen the weight he bore,
And the signals ran for a merchantman from Sandy Hook to the Nore.
He would not fly the Rovers' flag -- the bloody or the black,
But now he floated the Gridiron and now he flaunted the Jack.
He spoke of the Law as he crimped my crew -- he swore it was only a loan;
But when I would ask for my own again, he swore it was none of my own.
He has taken my little parrakeets that nest beneath the Line,
He has stripped my rails of the shaddock-frails and the green unripened pine;
He has taken my bale of dammer and spice I won beyond the seas,
He has taken my grinning heathen gods -- and what should he want o' these?
My foremast would not mend his boom, my deckhouse patch his boats;
He has whittled the two, this Yank Yahoo, to peddle for shoe-peg oats.
I could not fight for the failing light and a rough beam-sea beside,
But I hulled him once for a clumsy crimp and twice because he lied.
Had I had guns (as I had goods) to work my Christian harm,
I had run him up from his quarter-deck to trade with his own yard-arm;
I had nailed his ears to my capstan-head, and ripped them off with a saw,
And soused them in the bilgewater, and served them to him raw;
I had flung him blind in a rudderless boat to rot in the rocking dark,
I had towed him aft of his own craft, a bait for his brother shark;
I had lapped him round with cocoa husk, and drenched him with the oil,
And lashed him fast to his own mast to blaze above my spoil;
I had stripped his hide for my hammock-side, and tasselled his beard i' the mesh,
And spitted his crew on the live bamboo that grows through the gangrened flesh;
I had hove him down by the mangroves brown, where the mud-reef sucks and draws,
Moored by the heel to his own keel to wait for the land-crab's claws!
He is lazar within and lime without, ye can nose him far enow,
For he carries the taint of a musky ship -- the reek of the slaver's dhow!"
The skipper looked at the tiering guns and the bulwarks tall and cold,
And the Captains Three full courteously peered down at the gutted hold,
And the Captains Three called courteously from deck to scuttle-butt: --
"Good Sir, we ha' dealt with that merchantman or ever your teeth were cut.
Your words be words of a lawless race, and the Law it standeth thus:
He comes of a race that have never a Law, and he never has boarded us.
We ha' sold him canvas and rope and spar -- we know that his price is fair,
And we know that he weeps for the lack of a Law as he rides off Finisterre.
And since he is damned for a gallows-thief by you and better than you,
We hold it meet that the English fleet should know that we hold him true."
The skipper called to the tall taffrail: -- "And what is that to me?
Did ever you hear of a Yankee brig that rifled a Seventy-three?
Do I loom so large from your quarter-deck that I lift like a ship o' the Line?
He has learned to run from a shotted gun and harry such craft as mine.
There is never a Law on the Cocos Keys to hold a white man in,
But we do not steal the niggers' meal, for that is a ******'s sin.
Must he have his Law as a quid to chaw, or laid in brass on his wheel?
Does he steal with tears when he buccaneers? 'Fore Gad, then, why does he steal?"
The skipper bit on a deep-sea word, and the word it was not sweet,
For he could see the Captains Three had signalled to the Fleet.
But three and two, in white and blue, the whimpering flags began: --
"We have heard a tale of a -- foreign sail, but he is a merchantman."
The skipper peered beneath his palm and swore by the Great Horn Spoon: --
"'Fore Gad, the Chaplain of the Fleet would bless my picaroon!"
By two and three the flags blew free to lash the laughing air: --
"We have sold our spars to the merchantman -- we know that his price is fair."
The skipper winked his Western eye, and swore by a China storm: --
"They ha' rigged him a Joseph's jury-coat to keep his honour warm."
The halliards twanged against the tops, the bunting bellied broad,
The skipper spat in the empty hold and mourned for a wasted cord.
Masthead -- masthead, the signal sped by the line o' the British craft;
The skipper called to his Lascar crew, and put her about and laughed: --
"It's mainsail haul, my bully boys all -- we'll out to the seas again --
Ere they set us to paint their pirate saint, or scrub at his grapnel-chain.
It's fore-sheet free, with her head to the sea, and the swing of the unbought brine --
We'll make no sport in an English court till we come as a ship o' the Line:
Till we come as a ship o' the Line, my lads, of thirty foot in the sheer,
Lifting again from the outer main with news of a privateer;
Flying his pluck at our mizzen-truck for weft of Admiralty,
Heaving his head for our dipsey-lead in sign that we keep the sea.
Then fore-sheet home as she lifts to the foam -- we stand on the outward tack,
We are paid in the coin of the white man's trade -- the bezant is hard, ay, and black.
The frigate-bird shall carry my word to the Kling and the Orang-Laut
How a man may sail from a heathen coast to be robbed in a Christian port;
How a man may be robbed in Christian port while Three Great Captains there
Shall dip their flag to a slaver's rag -- to show that his trade is fair!"

 Out of the wood my White Knight came:
His eyes were bright with a bitter flame,
As I clung to his stirrup leather;
For I was only a dreaming lad,
Yet oh, what a wonderful faith I had!
And the song in my heart was never so glad,
As we took to the trail together.

"Friends and lovers, good-bye," I said;
Never once did I turn my head,
Though wickedly wild the weather
min were the rover's rags and scars,
And the rover's bed beneath the stars,
But never the shadow of prison bars,
As we ranged the world together.

Dreary and darkling was the trail,
But my Knight was clad in a gleaming mail,
And he plucked from his plume a feather.
And oh how foolishly proud was I!
"I'll wear it," I told him, "till I die;
Freemen we'll be of sea and sky,
To the ends of the earth together."

Yet now I know by my failing breath
I'm ripe for the last adventure, Death,
And I've reached the end of my tether:
But my Knight of the shining mail is there,
And his eyes are bright and he bids me dare:
So into the Dark let's boldly fare,
Into the Dark . . . together.

 Miss J.Hunter Dunn, Miss J.Hunter Dunn,
Furnish'd and burnish'd by Aldershot sun,
What strenuous singles we played after tea,
We in the tournament - you against me!

Love-thirty, love-forty, oh! weakness of joy,
The speed of a swallow, the grace of a boy,
With carefullest carelessness, gaily you won,
I am weak from your loveliness, Joan Hunter Dunn

Miss Joan Hunter Dunn, Miss Joan Hunter Dunn,
How mad I am, sad I am, glad that you won,
The warm-handled racket is back in its press,
But my shock-headed victor, she loves me no less.

Her father's euonymus shines as we walk,
And swing past the summer-house, buried in talk,
And cool the verandah that welcomes us in
To the six-o'clock news and a lime-juice and gin.

The scent of the conifers, sound of the bath,
The view from my bedroom of moss-dappled path,
As I struggle with double-end evening tie,
For we dance at the Golf Club, my victor and I.

On the floor of her bedroom lie blazer and shorts,
And the cream-coloured walls are be-trophied with sports,
And westering, questioning settles the sun,
On your low-leaded window, Miss Joan Hunter Dunn.

The Hillman is waiting, the light's in the hall,
The pictures of Egypt are bright on the wall,
My sweet, I am standing beside the oak stair
And there on the landing's the light on your hair.

By roads "not adopted", by woodlanded ways,
She drove to the club in the late summer haze,
Into nine-o'clock Camberley, heavy with bells
And mushroomy, pine-woody, evergreen smells.

Miss Joan Hunter Dunn, Miss Joan Hunter Dunn,
I can hear from the car park the dance has begun,
Oh! Surry twilight! importunate band!
Oh! strongly adorable tennis-girl's hand!

Around us are Rovers and Austins afar,
Above us the intimate roof of the car,
And here on my right is the girl of my choice,
With the tilt of her nose and the chime of her voice.

And the scent of her wrap, and the words never said,
And the ominous, ominous dancing ahead.
We sat in the car park till twenty to one
And now I'm engaged to Miss Joan Hunter Dunn.

 No stir in the air, no stir in the sea, 
The Ship was still as she could be; 
Her sails from heaven received no motion, 
Her keel was steady in the ocean. 

Without either sign or sound of their shock, 
The waves flow’d over the Inchcape Rock; 
So little they rose, so little they fell, 
They did not move the Inchcape Bell.

The Abbot of Aberbrothok 
Had placed that bell on the Inchcape Rock; 
On a buoy in the storm it floated and swung, 
And over the waves its warning rung.

When the Rock was hid by the surge’s swell, 
The Mariners heard the warning Bell; 
And then they knew the perilous Rock, 
And blest the Abbot of Aberbrothok

The Sun in the heaven was shining gay, 
All things were joyful on that day; 
The sea-birds scream’d as they wheel’d round, 
And there was joyaunce in their sound. 

The buoy of the Inchcpe Bell was seen
A darker speck on the ocean green; 
Sir Ralph the Rover walk’d his deck, 
And fix’d his eye on the darker speck. 

He felt the cheering power of spring, 
It made him whistle, it made him sing; 
His heart was mirthful to excess, 
But the Rover’s mirth was wickedness. 

His eye was on the Inchcape Float; 
Quoth he, “My men, put out the boat, 
And row me to the Inchcape Rock, 
And I’ll plague the Abbot of Aberbrothok.” 

The boat is lower’d, the boatmen row, 
And to the Inchcape Rock they go; 
Sir Ralph bent over from the boat, 
And he cut the bell from the Inchcape Float.

Down sank the Bell with a gurgling sound, 
The bubbles rose and burst around; 
Quoth Sir Ralph, “The next who comes to the Rock,
Won’t bless the Abbot of Aberbrothok.” 

Sir ralph the Rover sail’d away, 
He scour’d the seas for many a day; 
And now grown rich with plunder’d store, 
He steers his course for Scotland’s shore. 

So thick a haze o’erspreads the sky, 
They cannot see the sun on high; 
The wind hath blown a gale all day, 
At evening it hath died away. 

On the deck the Rover takes his stand, 
So dark it is they see no land. 
Quoth Sir Ralph, “It will be lighter soon, 
For there is the dawn of the rising Moon.” 

“Canst hear,” said one, “the breakers roar? 
For methinks we should be near the shore.” 
“Now, where we are I cannot tell, 
But I wish we could hear the Inchcape Bell.” 

They hear no sound, the swell is strong, 
Though the wind hath fallen they drift along; 
Till the vessel strikes with a shivering shock, 
“Oh Christ! It is the Inchcape Rock!” 

Sir Ralph the Rover tore his hair, 
He curst himself in his despair; 
The waves rush in on every side, 
The ship is sinking beneath the tide. 

But even is his dying fear, 
One dreadful sound could the Rover hear; 
A sound as if with the Inchcape Bell, 
The Devil below was ringing his knell.

 1895

There's a Legion that never was listed,
 That carries no colours or crest,
But, split in a thousand detachments,
 Is breaking the road for the rest.
Our fathers they left us their blessing --
 They taught us, and groomed us, and crammed;
But we've shaken the Clubs and the Messes
 To go and find out and be damned
 (Dear boys!),
 To go and get shot and be damned.

So some of us chivvy the slaver,
 And some of us cherish the black,
And some of us hunt on the Oil Coast,
 And some on the Wallaby track:
And some of us drift to Sarawak,
 And some of us drift up The Fly,
And some share our tucker with tigers,
 And some with the gentle Masai,
 (Dear boys!),
 Take tea with the giddy Masai.

We've painted The Islands vermilion,
 We've pearled on half-shares in the Bay,
We've shouted on seven-ounce nuggets,
 We've starved on a Seedeeboy's pay;
We've laughed at the world as we found it, --
 Its women and cities and men --
From Sayyid Burgash in a tantrum
 To the smoke-reddened eyes of Loben,
 (Dear boys!),
 We've a little account with Loben.

The ends of the Farth were our portion,
 The ocean at large was our share.
There was never a skirmish to windward
 But the Leaderless Legion was there:
Yes, somehow and somewhere and always
 We were first when the trouble began,
From a lottery-row in Manila,
 To an I. D. B. race on the Pan
 (Dear boys!),
 With the Mounted Police on the Pan.

We preach in advance of the Army,
 We skirmish ahead of the Church,
With never a gunboat to help us
 When we're scuppered and left in the lurch.
But we know as the cartridges finish,
 And we're filed on our last little shelves,
That the Legion that never was listed
 Will send us as good as ourselves
 (Good men!),
 Five hundred as good as ourselves!

Then a health (we must drink it in whispers),
 To our wholly unauthorized horde --

To the line of our dusty foreloopers,
 The Gentlemen Rovers abroad --
Yes, a health to ourselves ere we scatter,
 For the steamer won't wait for the train,
And the Legion that never was listed
 Goes back into quarters again!
 'Regards!
 Goes back under canvas again.
 Hurrah!
 The swag and the billy again.
 Here's how!
 The trail and the packhorse again.
 Salue!
 The trek and the laager again!

 We'd left the sea-gulls long behind,
And we were almost in mid-ocean;
The sky was soft and blue and kind,
The boat had scarcely any motion;
Except that songfully it sped,
And sheared the foam swift as an arrow . . .
There fluttered down a city sparrow.

I stared with something of surprise;
The apparition mocked my seeming;
In fact I gently rubbed my eyes
And wondered if I were not dreaming.
It must, I mused, at Montreal
Have hopped abroad, somewhere to nestle,
And failed to hear the warning call
For visitors to leave he vessel.

Well, anyway a bird it was,
With winky eyes and wings a-twitter,
Unwise to migration Laws,
From Canada a hardy flitter;
And as it hopped about the deck
So happily I wondered whether
It wasn't scramming from Quebec
For London's mild and moister weather.

My rover's heart went out to it,
That vain, vivacious little devil;
And as I watched it hop and flit
I hoped it would not come to evil;
It planned above the plangent sea
(A foolish flight, I'd never risk it),
And then it circled back to me
And from my palm picked crumbs of biscuit.

Well, voyages come to an end
(WE make them with that understanding);
One morn I missed my feathered friend,
And hope it made a happy landing.
Oh may she ever happy be
(It 'twas a "she") with eggs to sit on,
And rest on our side of he sea,
A brave, brown, cheery, chirping Briton.

 weary lot is thine, fair maid,
A weary lot is thine!
To pull the thorn thy brow to braid,
And press the rue for wine.
A lightsome eye, a soldier's mien,
A feather of the blue,
A doublet of the Lincoln green—
No more of me ye knew,
My Love!
No more of me ye knew.
'This morn is merry June, I trow,
The rose is budding fain;
But she shall bloom in winter snow
Ere we two meet again.'
—He turn'd his charger as he spake
Upon the river shore,
He gave the bridle-reins a shake,
Said 'Adieu for evermore,
My Love!
And adieu for evermore.'

 The glory of ships is an old, old song,
since the days when the sea-rovers ran 
In their open boats through the roaring surf,
and the spread of the world began; 
The glory of ships is a light on the sea,
and a star in the story of man. 

When Homer sang of the galleys of Greece
that conquered the Trojan shore,
And Solomon lauded the barks of Tyre that
brought great wealth to his door, 
'Twas little they knew, those ancient men,
what would come of the sail and the oar. 

The Greek ships rescued the West from the East,
when they harried the Persians home; 
And the Roman ships were the wings of strength
that bore up the empire, Rome;
And the ships of Spain found a wide new world,
far over the fields of foam. 

Then the tribes of courage at last saw clear
that the ocean was not a bound,
But a broad highway, and a challenge to seek
for treasure as yet unfound;
So the fearless ships fared forth to the search,
in joy that the globe was round. 

Their hulls were heightened, their sails spread out,
they grew with the growth of their quest; 
They opened the secret doors of the East,
and the golden gates of the West; 
And many a city of high renown
was proud of a ship on its crest. 

The fleets of England and Holland and France
were at strife with each other and Spain; 
And battle and storm sent a myriad ships
to sleep in the depths of the main; 
But the seafaring spirit could never be drowned,
and it filled up the fleets again. 

They greatened and grew, with the aid of steam,
to a wonderful, vast array,
That carries the thoughts and the traffic of men
into every harbor and bay;
And now in the world-wide work of the ships
'tis England that leads the way. 

O well for the leading that follows the law
of a common right on the sea!
But ill for the leader who tries to hold
what belongs to mankind in fee!
The way of the ships is an open way,
and the ocean must ever be free! 

Remember, O first of the maritime folk,
how the rise of your greatness began. 
It will live if you safeguard the round-the-world road
from the shame of a selfish ban;
For the glory of ships is a light on the sea,
and a star in the story of man!

 ("En partant du Golfe d'Otrante.") 
 
 {Bk. XXVIII.} 


 We told thirty when we started 
 From port so taut and fine, 
 But soon our crew were parted, 
 Till now we number nine. 
 
 Tom Robbins, English, tall and straight, 
 Left us at Aetna light; 
 He left us to investigate 
 What made the mountain bright; 
 "I mean to ask Old Nick himself, 
 (And here his eye he rolls) 
 If I can't bring Newcastle pelf 
 By selling him some coals!" 
 
 In Calabree, a lass and cup 
 Drove scowling Spada wild: 
 She only held her finger up, 
 And there he drank and smiled; 
 And over in Gaëta Bay, 
 Ascanio—ashore 
 A fool!—must wed a widow gay 
 Who'd buried three or four. 
 
 At Naples, woe! poor Ned they hanged— 
 Hemp neckcloth he disdained— 
 And prettily we all were banged— 
 And two more blades remained 
 
 To serve the Duke, and row in chains— 
 Thank saints! 'twas not my cast! 
 We drank deliverance from pains— 
 We who'd the ducats fast. 
 
 At Malta Dick became a monk— 
 (What vineyards have those priests!) 
 And Gobbo to quack-salver sunk, 
 To leech vile murrained beasts; 
 And lazy André, blown off shore, 
 Was picked up by the Turk, 
 And in some harem, you be sure, 
 Is forced at last to work. 
 
 Next, three of us whom nothing daunts, 
 Marched off with Prince Eugene, 
 To take Genoa! oh, it vaunts 
 Girls fit—each one—for queen! 
 Had they but promised us the pick, 
 Perchance we had joined, all; 
 But battering bastions built of brick— 
 Bah, give me wooden wall! 
 
 By Leghorn, twenty caravels 
 Came 'cross our lonely sail— 
 Spinoza's Sea-Invincibles! 
 But, whew! our shots like hail 
 Made shortish work of galley long 
 And chubby sailing craft— 
 Our making ready first to close 
 Sent them a-spinning aft. 
 
 Off Marseilles, ne'er by sun forsook 
 We friends fell-to as foes! 
 For Lucca Diavolo mistook 
 Angelo's wife for Rose, 
 
 And hang me! soon the angel slid 
 The devil in the sea, 
 And would of lass likewise be rid— 
 And so we fought it free! 
 
 At Palmas eight or so gave slip, 
 Pescara to pursue, 
 And more, perchance, had left the ship, 
 But Algiers loomed in view; 
 And here we cruised to intercept 
 Some lucky-laden rogues, 
 Whose gold-galleons but slowly crept, 
 So that we trounced the dogs! 
 
 And after making war out there, 
 We made love at "the Gib." 
 We ten—no more! we took it fair, 
 And kissed the gov'nor's "rib," 
 And made the King of Spain our take, 
 Believe or not, who cares? 
 I tell ye that he begged till black 
 I' the face to have his shares. 
 
 We're rovers of the restless main, 
 But we've some conscience, mark! 
 And we know what it is to reign, 
 And finally did heark— 
 Aye, masters of the narrow Neck, 
 We hearkened to our heart, 
 And gave him freedom on our deck, 
 His town, and gold—in part. 
 
 My lucky mates for that were made 
 Grandees of Old Castile, 
 And maids of honor went to wed, 
 Somewhere in sweet Seville; 
 
 Not they for me were fair enough, 
 And so his Majesty 
 Declared his daughter—'tis no scoff! 
 My beauteous bride should be. 
 
 "A royal daughter!" think of that! 
 But I would never one. 
 I have a lass (I said it pat) 
 Who's not been bred like nun— 
 But, merry maid with eagle eye, 
 It's proud she smiles and bright, 
 And sings upon the cliff, to spy 
 My ship a-heave in sight! 
 
 My Faenzetta has my heart! 
 In Fiesoné she 
 The fairest! Nothing shall us part, 
 Saving, in sooth, the Sea! 
 And that not long! its rolling wave 
 And such breeze holding now 
 Will send me along to her I love— 
 And so I made my bow. 
 
 We told thirty when we started 
 From port so taut and fine, 
 But thus our crew were parted, 
 And now we number nine. 


 

 In youth I gnawed life's bitter rind
And shared the rugged lot
Of fellows rude and unrefined,
Frustrated and forgot;
And now alas! it is too late
My sorry ways to mend,
So sadly I accept my fate,
A Roughneck to the end.

Profanity is in my voice
And slag is in my rhyme,
For I have mucked with men who curse
And grovel in the grime;
My fingers were not formed, I fear,
To frame a pretty pen,
So please forgive me if I veer
From Virtue now and then.

For I would be the living voice,
Though raucous is its tone,
Of men who rarely may rejoice,
Yet barely ever moan:
The rovers of the raw-ribbed lands,
The lads of lowly worth,
The scallywags with scaley hands
Who weld the ends of earth.