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merely the most famous example, from the writer with the pedigree of a classi-
cal education, of a wide variety of imperial verses circulating in school text-
books and in the public press—a circulation that increased and even exploded
during the First World War. Newbolt’s verses trope the drumbeat of steady,
easily perceived rhythm and therefore imagine an English audience that re-
sponds to his verses physically, as a patriotic call. Though not all ballads, New-
bolt’s poems evoke and envision a national collective unified behind “the na-
tion’s cause.”^45 Yet this unification, while upholding Arnold’s aims, ultimately
reverses them.
Though Newbolt experimented in classical meter and syllabic verse, most
reviews of his first book, Admirals All (1897), focused on the poem’s effect
on the reader: “When he is well set in a swinging metre, Mr. Newbolt’s verve
and virility are tremendous,” a review in Literature states. “Here are all the
qualities of ballad poetry—simplicity, directness, a vivid impression, and the
quick sympathy which leaps from word to eye, and makes every reader yearn
to be up and doing.”^46 Newbolt’s ballads, like those of Thomas Davis, appealed
directly to the reader’s keen sense of duty. Newbolt’s “swinging metres” were
successful precisely because they played into Edwardian era patriotic sympa-
thies—simple, crafted narratives that nonetheless satisfied the nation’s goals
for poetry. A Globe reviewer (quoted in the promotional pages of Admirals
All) wrote, “[w]e should like to see these stirring verses in the hands of every
high-spirited youth in the Empire.” The poems are “stirring” because of the
way their narratives seem to comment on, at the same time as they are pro-
pelled by, Newbolt’s distinctively English rhythm. The Scotsman reviewer ex-
plicitly stated that Newbolt’s choice of form was inherently appropriate to the
national spirit it promoted: “All the pieces [in Admirals All] are instinct with
the national English spirit. They are written in a sturdy rhythmical speech,
worthy of their high themes.”^47 The reviewer’s use of the word “instinct” is key
here—the national spirit is imbued in the sturdy rhythms, to use the formal
definition of “instinct,” but this saturation of spirit in rhythm is also conceived
as an “instinct”—a pattern that is perceived to be innate or natural rather than
learned.
Newbolt’s poetry nationalizes anew Arnold’s argument about the beat;
joining rhythm to national duty and sacrifice, Arnold’s intimate collectivity is
put on broad and ostentatious display. In the title poem “Admirals All,” New-
bolt lists admirals who share names with England’s poets (“Here’s to the bold
and free! / Benbow, Collingwood, Byron, Blake, / Hail to the Kings of the
Sea!”), emphasizing that writing poetry and defending the country are joined.
Newbolt’s two most famous poems, “Vitae Lampada” and “Drake’s Drum,”
both appear for the first time in Admirals All and thematize the power of
rhythm to inspire patriotic, military action. Although both poems have been
and should be read in the context of the Boer War,^48 each circulated widely in
anthologies and were reprinted in Newbolt’s books The Island Race (1898),