Arm! The First Rifle Ballad, January, 1852 Poem by Martin Farquhar Tupper

Englishmen up! make ready your rifles!
Who can tell now what a day may bring forth?
Patch up all quarrels, and stick at no trifles,-
Let the world see what your loyalty's worth!
Loyalty? - selfishness, cowardice, terror
Stoutly will multiply loyalty's sum,
When to astonish presumption and error,
Soon the shout rises,- the brigands are come!

Cannot we see them? - impatiently waiting,
Hundreds of thousands, all hungry for spoil,
Breathing out slaughter, and bitterly hating
Britain and all that is born of her soil!
Jesuit priests and praetorian legions
Clamour like hounds to be loosed on the prey,
Eager to devastate Protestant regions,
And to take vengeance for Waterloo day!

If the Kite wants to be counted an Eagle,
What can he better be scheming than this,-
While a false peace our minds may inveigle,
And we are sold to a Judas's kiss?
Suddenly, secretly, boldly he'll do it!
And the sharp sword, that will ravage the coasts,
Then shall run into the land, and go through it,
If Britain sleeps at her sentinel-posts!

Marksmen ashore! make ready, make ready!
Honest men slumber, but thieves are astir;
Steamers afloat,- be stirring and steady!
All will be lost, if your vigilance err;
Every one,- sporting or spinning or farming,
Wisely defend what you have while you can,
Steadily drilling, and sturdily arming,
That you may fight for the right like a man!

Think of the rapine, the flames, and the slaughter,
If the fierce Algerine-Frenchman here stood!
Think, if you dare, or your wife and your daughter,
Think of your little ones choked in their blood!
What! - is the wolf so squamish and tender
As to be stopp'd by a peacemonger's tear?
No! - if it finds not a stalwart defender
Every man's home is a Golgotha here!

Up, then, and ARM! it is wisdom and duty;
We are too tempting a prize to be weak:
Lo, what a pillage of riches and beauty,
Glories to gain, and revenges to wreak!
Run for your rifles, and stand to your drilling;
Let not the wolf have his will, as he might
If, in the midst of their trading and tilling,
Englishmen cannot - or care not to - fight!