Fierce noon beats hard on the battle; the galleons that loom to the lee Bow down, heel over, uplifting their shelterless hulls from the sea: From scuppers aspirt with blood, from guns dismounted and dumb, The signs of the doom they looked for, the loud mute witnesses come. They press with sunset to seaward for comfort: and shall not they find it there? O servants of God most high, shall his winds not pass you by, and his waves not spare? [Pg 202] III The wings of the south-west wind are widened; the breath of his fervent lips, More keen than a sword's edge, fiercer than fire, falls full on the plunging ships. The pilot is he of their northward flight, their stay and their steersman he; A helmsman clothed with the tempest, and girdled with strength to constrain the sea. And the host of them trembles and quails, caught fast in his hand as a bird in the toils; For the wrath and the joy that fulfil him are mightier than man's, whom he slays and spoils. And vainly, with heart divided in sunder, and labour of wavering will, The lord of their host takes counsel with hope if haply their star shine still, If haply some light be left them of chance to renew and redeem the fray; But the will of the black south-wester is lord of the councils of war to-day. One only spirit it quells not, a splendour undarkened of chance or time; Be the praise of his foes with Oquendo for ever, a name as a star sublime.
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