1667: Dutch Invasion, Rudyard Kipling Listen to 'Dutch Invasion' -

If wars were won by feasting,
Or victory by song,
Or safety found, by sleeping sound
How England would be strong!
But honour and dominion
Are not maintain-ed so,
They're only got by sword and shot
And this the Dutchmen know!
 
The moneys that should feed us
you spend on your delight,
How can you then, have sailor-men
To aid you in your fight?
Our fish and cheese are rotten,
Which makes the scurvy grow
We cannot serve you if we starve,
And this the Dutchmen know!
 
Our ships in every harbour
Be neither whole nor sound,
And when we seek to mend a leak,
No Oakum can be found,
Or, if it is, the caulkers,
and carpenters also,
For lack of pay have gone away,
And this the Dutch men know!
 
Mere powder, guns and bullets,
we scarce can get at all;
Their price was spent in merriment
and revel at Whitehall,
While we in tattered doublets
From ship to ship must row,
Beseeching friends for odds and ends
And this the Dutchmen know!
 
No King will heed our warnings,
No Court will pay our claims
Our King and Court for their disport
Do sell the very Thames!
For, now De Ruyter's topsails
Off naked Chatham show,
We dare not meet him with our fleet
And this the Dutchmen know!

Better still spend that money on education and fair trade and justice and we will no longer need barbaric armaments!