High on its curving hillside
The windmill stands and sees
Below it copse and pasture
And hamlet bowered in trees.
It sees the white road winding
From London to the sea,
That saw the laurelled coaches
Bear news of victory.
It sees the Hundred Acre
Where now the plough teams go,
The striving steaming horses,
The ploughman trudging slow.
The gulls that scream and wrangle
The shining share behind
That cleaves the turf, unbroken
Since time nigh out of mind.
Where soon the green wheat springing
Like spears in rest shall come,
And soon again the reaping
And day of harvest home.
Turn, turn, you sails triumphant,
Grind surely, stones, and well -
So turned they, and so ground they,
The year Napoleon fell.