:To the legion of the lost ones, to the cohort of the damned,
:    To my brethren in their sorrow overseas,
:Sings a gentleman of England cleanly bred, machinely crammed,
:    And a trooper of the Empress, if you please.
:Yea, a trooper of the forces who has run his own six horses,
:    And faith he went the pace and went it blind,
:And the world was more than kin while he held the ready tin,
:    But to-day the Sergeant's something less than kind.
:::We're poor little lambs who've lost our way,
:::    Baa! Baa! Baa!
:::We're little black sheep who've gone astray,
:::    Baa—aa—aa!
:::Gentlemen-rankers out on the spree,
:::Damned from here to Eternity,
:::God ha' mercy on such as we,
:::    Baa! Yah! Bah!
:Oh, it's sweet to sweat through stables, sweet to empty kitchen slops,
:    And it's sweet to hear the tales the troopers tell,
:To dance with blowzy housemaids at the regimental hops
:    And thrash the cad who says you waltz too well.
:Yes, it makes you cock-a-hoop to be "Rider" to your troop,
:    And branded with a blasted worsted spur,
:When you envy, O how keenly, one poor Tommy being cleanly
:    Who blacks your boots and sometimes calls you "Sir".
:If the home we never write to, and the oaths we never keep,
:    And all we know most distant and most dear,
:Across the snoring barrack-room return to break our sleep,
:    Can you blame us if we soak ourselves in beer?
:When the drunken comrade mutters and the great guard-lantern gutters
:    And the horror of our fall is written plain,
:Every secret, self-revealing on the aching white-washed ceiling,
:    Do you wonder that we drug ourselves from pain?
:We have done with Hope and Honour, we are lost to Love and Truth,
:    We are dropping down the ladder rung by rung,
:And the measure of our torment is the measure of our youth.
:    God help us, for we knew the worst too young!
:Our shame is clean repentance for the crime that brought the sentence,
:    Our pride it is to know no spur of pride,
:And the Curse of Reuben holds us till an alien turf enfolds us
:    And we die, and none can tell Them where we died.
:::We're poor little lambs who've lost our way,
:::    Baa! Baa! Baa!
:::We're little black sheep who've gone astray,
:::    Baa—aa—aa!
:::Gentlemen-rankers out on the spree,
:::Damned from here to Eternity,
:::God ha' mercy on such as we,
:::    Baa! Yah! Bah!