When Kattegat now or the Belt you sail, <br />No more will you sight <br />The Danish proud frigate, no more will you hail <br />The red and white; <br />No more will the ringing command be heard <br />In Wessel's tongue, <br />No rollicking music, no jocund word, <br />'Neath Dannebrog sung. <br />No dance will you see, no laughter meet, <br />As the white sails shine, <br />From mast and from stern no garland you greet, <br />Of arts the sign. <br />But all that we owned of the treasures on board <br />The deeps now hold; <br />One sad winter night to the sea-waves were poured <br />Our memories old. <br /> <br />It was that same night, when the frigate nigh <br />To Norway's land <br />Distress-guns was firing, the surf running high <br />With sea-weed and sand. <br />To help from the harbor men put out boats, <br />But they turn back,… <br />The frigate toward Germany drifting floats, <br />A broken wrack! <br />What once had been ours overboard was strown, <br />Each kinship mark <br />Was quickly removed, to the sea it was thrown <br />With curses stark! <br />The Northern lion, that figure-head gray, <br />Now had to fall, <br />In pieces 'twas hewn, and the frigate lay <br />Like a shattered wall. <br />… <br />Repaired and refitted, its canvas it spread <br />Near Germany's coast, <br />With black-yellow flag and an eagle dread <br />In the lion's post. <br />When sailing we Kattegat sweep with our eyes, <br />'T is still evermore. <br />But a German admiral's frigate lies <br />Near Scania's shore.<br /><br />Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/when-norway-would-not-help/
