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THE SEVENTEEN BRIGHT STARS 277
But we were at the heels of her, and night coming on, At six o'clock that very night the bloody fight begun. With broadside to broadside we play'd them two to one, Till the blood out of the scupper holes all in a gore did run.
Both round, grape, and double-head we poured in so fast, [That] at eight o'clock that very night down came [her] mizen
mast. We engag'd them five glasses as close as we could lay, While great guns, small arms, and cutlasses most sweetly they did
play.
The Frenchmen all for quarters aloud to us did cry ; Their colours struck, no more could fight for love or liberty. But the remnant of their shattered crew they unto us' tell That out of fifteen hundred men eight hundred of them fell.
This ship was call'd. the Droits de PHomme; from Brest she lately
came, With guns mounted ninety-eight on board and fifteen hundred
men. Her intention was Ireland her troops all there to land, But bold Pellew and his ship's crew did stop their warlike band.
Twas early the next morning the land it did appear, And they were so disabled, from it they could not get clear; And we were so disabled we couH not veer or tack, But down alongside our enemy we soon became a wreck.
So now the Indefatigable is bound for England's shore
To let our suffering country know the Amazon's no more.
Still, we'll drink to George our King, we'll convince him of the
same, That British tars for evermore rule lords of the main. |
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A NEW SONG.
Come, all you bold Britons to the seas do belong, Of the seventeen bright stars I will sing you a song. On the 15th of April, at Spithead as we lay, Lord Bridport he hove out a signal to weigh: But we one and all refused to obey. |
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