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THE WOMEN OF MUMBLES HEAD
by
Clement Scott
Bring, novelists, your note book bring, dramatists, your pen,
And I'll tell you a simple story of what women do for men.
It's only a tale of a lifeboat, the dying and the dead,
Of a terrible storm and shipwreck, that happened off Mumbles Head.
Maybe you have travelled in Wales, sir, and know it north and south,
Maybe you are friends with the 'natives' that dwell at Oystermouth,
It happens, no doubt, that from Bristol you've crossed in a casual
way,
And have sailed you yacht in the summer in the blue of Swansea Bay.
Well, it isn't like that in the winter, when the lighthouse stands
alone,
In the teeth of Atlantic breakers, that foam on its face of stone.
It wasn't like that when the hurricane blew, and the storm bell
tolled, or when
There was news of a wreck, and the lifeboat launched, and a desperate
cry for men.
When the world did the coxswain shirk? a brave old salt was he,
Proud to the bone of as four strong lads as ever had tasted the
sea,
Welshmen all to the lungs and loins, who, about the coast, `twas
said,
Had saved some hundred lives apiece--at a shilling or so a head.
So the father launched the lifeboat, in the teeth of the tempest's
roar,
And he stood like a man at the rudder, with an eye on his boys at
the oar,
Out to the wreck went the father, out to the wreck went the sons,
Leaving the weeping women, and the booming of signal guns.
Leaving the mother who loved them, and the girls that the sailors
love,
Going to death for duty, and trusting to God above.
Do you murmur a prayer, my brothers, when cosy and safe in bed,
For men like these, who are ready to die for a wreck off Mumbles
Head.
It didn't go well with the lifeboat, `twas a terrible storm that
blew,
And it snapped the rope in a second that was flung to the drowning
crew.
And then the anchor parted--`twas a tussle to keep afloat,
But the father stuck to the rudder, and the boys to the brave old
boat.
Then at last on the poor doomed lifeboat a wave broke mountains
high,
'God help us now', said the father, 'It's over, my lads. Goodbye'.
Half of the crew swam shorewards, half to the sheltered caves.
But father and sons were fighting death in the foam of the angry
waves.
Up at a lighthouse window two women beheld the storm,
And saw in the boiling breakers a figure--a fighting form.
It might be a grey-haired father, then the women held their breath,
It might be a fair-haired brother, who was having a round with death.
It might be a lover, a husband, whose kisses were on the lips
Of the women whose love is the life of men going down to the sea
in ships,
They had seen the launch of the lifeboat, they had seen the worst
and more,
Then, kissing each other, these women went down,
From the lighthouse straight to the shore.
There by the rocks on the breakers these sisters, hand in hand,
Beheld once more that desperate man who struggled to reach the land.
`Twas only aid he wanted to help him across the wave,
What are a couple of women? well more than three craven men
Who stood by the shore with chattering teeth, refusing to stir--and
then
Off went the women's shawls, sir, in a second they're torn and rent,
Then knotting them into a rope of love, straight into the sea they
went.
'Come back', cried the lighthouse-keeper, 'for God's sake, girls,
come back'.
As they caught the waves on their foreheads, resisting the fierce
attack.
'Come back', moaned the grey-haired mother, as she stood by the
angry sea
'If the waves take you, my darlings, there's nobody left to me'.
'Come back', said the three strong soldiers, who still stood faint
and pale,
'You will drown if you face the breakers, you will fall if you brave
the gale'.
'Come back', said the girls, 'we will not, go tell it to all the
town,
'We'll lose our lives, God willing, before that man shall drown'.
'Give one more knot to the shawls, Bess, give one strong clutch
of your hand,
Just follow me, brave, to the shingle, and we'll bring him safe
to land.
Wait for the next wave, darling, only a minute more,
And I'll have him safe in my arms, dear, and we'll drag him safe
to shore'.
Up to the arms in the water, fighting it breast to breast
They caught and saved a brother alive, God bless us, you know the
rest--
Well, many a heart beat stronger, and many a tear was shed,
And many a glass was tossed right off to "The Women of Mumbles Head". |
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