to Ascalon

I don't think I'd ever read Joan Aiken's The Shadow Guests before.

This verse - sung by the ghost of a young boy headed off to the Crusades who isn't very good at fighting, and repeated at the end of the novel - justabout breaks my heart:

See the crusader
Stride up the lane.
He will be a hero
When he comes again.

Gallant are they
Who now have gone
With helmet and sword
To Ascalon.
If he be not
In battle slain
He will be a hero
When he comes again.