When he heard they had taken my grandsire:
And twelve thousand gentlemen more.

"At Namur, Ramillies, and Malplaquet
Were we posted, on plain or in trench:
Malbrook only need to attack it
And away from him scamper'd we French.
Cheer up! 'tis no use to be glum, boys,--
'Tis written, since fighting begun,
That sometimes we fight and we conquer,
And sometimes we fight and we run.

"To fight and to run was our fate:
Our fortune and fame had departed.
And so perish'd Louis the Great,--
Old, lonely, and half broken-hearted.
His coffin they pelted with mud,
His body they tried to lay hands on;
And so having buried King Louis
They loyally served his great-grandson.

"God save the beloved King Louis!
(For so he was nicknamed by some,)
And now came my father to do his
King's orders and beat on the drum.
My grandsire was dead, but his bones
Must have shaken I'm certain for joy,
To hear daddy drumming the English
From the meadows of famed Fontenoy.