What have the cavalry done? <br />Cantered and trotted about, <br />Routin' the enemy out, <br />Causin' the beggars to run! <br />And we tramped along in the blazin' heat, <br />Over the veldt on our weary feet. <br />Tramp, tramp, tramp <br />Under the blazin' sun, <br />With never the sight of a bloomin' Boer, <br />'Cause they'd hunted 'em long before -- <br />That's what the cavalry done! <br />What have the gunners done <br />Battlin' every day, <br />Battlin' any way. <br />Boers outranged 'em, but what cared they? <br />"Shoot and be damned," said the R.H.A.! <br />See! when the fight grows hot, <br />Under the rifles or not, <br />Always the order runs, <br />"Fetch up the bloomin' guns!" <br /> <br />And you'd see them great gun horses spring <br />To the "action front" -- and around they'd swing. <br />Find the range with some queer machine <br />"At four thousand with fuse fourteen. <br />Ready! Fire number one!" <br />Handled the battery neat and quick! <br />Stick to it, too! How did they stick! <br />Never a gunner was seen to run! <br />Never a gunner would leave his gun! <br />Not though his mates dropped all around! <br />Always a gunner would stand his ground. <br />Take the army -- the infantry, <br />Mounted rifles, and cavalry, <br />Twice the numbers I'd give away, <br />And I'd fight the lot with the R.H.A., <br />For they showed us how a corps should be run, <br />That's what the gunners done!<br /><br />Andrew Barton Paterson<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/what-have-the-cavalry-done/
