No dread of death if with us die our foes-
Save that it seems even duller than repose:
Come when it will we snatch the life of life-
When lost - what recks it by disease or strife?
Let him who crawls enamored of decay,
Cling to his couch and sicken years away;
Heave his thick breath, and shake his palsied
head :
Ours the fresh turf, and not the feverish bed.
While gasp by gasp he falters forth his soul,
Ours with one pang- one bound-escapes con-
trol.
His corse may boast its urn and narrow cave,
And they who loathed his life may gild his grave:
Ours are the tears, though few, sincerely shed,
When Ocean shrouds and sepulchres our dead.
For us, even banquets fond regrets supply
In the red cup that crowns our memory;
And the brief epitaph in danger's day,
When those who win at length divide the prey,
And cry, Remembrance saddening o'er each brow,
How had the brave who fell exulted now!
JUST in thy mould and beauteous in thy form,
Gentle in roll and buoyant on the surge,
Light as the sea-fowl rocking in the storm,
In breeze and gale thy onward course we urge,
My water-queen!
More light and swift than thou none thread the
With surer keel or steadier on its path,
We brave each waste of ocean-mystery
And laugh to hear the howling tempest's wrath,
For we are thine.
Trust to the mystic power that points thy way,
Trust to the eye that pierces from afar;
Trust the red meteors that around thee play,
And, fearless, trust the Sea-Green Lady's Star,
Thou bark divine!"
IN THE MEDITERRANEAN.
ON deck, beneath the awning,
I dozing lay and yawning;
It was the gray of dawning.
Ere yet the sun arose ·
So I lay, and wondered why light
Came not, and watched the twilight,
And the glimmer of the skylight,
That shot across the deck;
And the binnacle pale and steady,
And the dull glimpse of the dead-eye,
And the sparks in fiery eddy
That whirled from the chimney neck. In our jovial floating prison
There was sleep from fore to mizzen,
And never a star had risen
The hazy sky to speck.
Strange company we harbored :
We'd a hundred Jews to larboard,
Unwashed, uncombed, unbarbered,
Jews black and brown and gray.
With terror it would seize ye, And make your souls uneasy, To see those Rabbis greasy,
Who did naught but scratch and pray. Their dirty children puking, Their dirty saucepans cooking, Their dirty fingers hooking
Their swarming fleas away.
To starboard Turks and Greeks were,
Whiskered and brown their cheeks were,
Enormous wide their breeks were,
Their pipes did puff away;
Each on his mat allotted
In silence smoked and squatted,
Whilst round their children trotted
In pretty, pleasant play.
He can't but smile who traces
The smiles on those brown faces,
And the pretty, prattling graces
Of those small heathens gay.
And so the hours kept tolling;
And through the ocean rolling
Went the brave Iberia bowling,
Before the break of day, -
When a squall, upon a sudden,
Came o'er the waters scudding;
And the clouds began to gather,
And the sea was lashed to lather,
And the lowering thunder grumbled,
And the lightning jumped and tumbled,
And the ship, and all the ocean,
Woke up in wild commotion.
Then the wind set up a howling,
And the poodle dog a yowling,
And the cocks began a crowing,
And the old cow raised a lowing,
As she heard the tempest blowing;
And fowls and geese did cackle,
And the cordage and the tackle
Began to shrick and crackle;
And the spray dashed o'er the funnels,
And down the deck in runnels ;
And the rushing water soaks all,
From the seamen in the fo'ksal
To the stokers, whose black faces
Peer out of their bed-places;
And the captain he was bawling,
And the sailors pulling, hauling,
And the quarter-deck tarpauling
Was shivered in the squalling;
And the passengers awaken,
Most pitifully shaken ;
And the steward jumps up, and hastens
For the necessary basins.
Then the Greeks they groaned and quivered.
And they knelt and moaned and shivered,
As the plunging waters met them,
And splashed and overset them ;
And they called in their emergence
Upon countless saints and virgins;
And their marrowbones are bended,
And they think the world is ended.
And the Turkish women for'ard
Were frightened and behorrored;
And, shrieking and bewildering,
The mothers clutched their children;
The men sang
"Allah Illah!
Mashallah Bismillah !"
As the warring waters doused them,
And splashed them and soused them;
And they called upon the Prophet,
Who thought but little of it.
Then all the fleas in Jewry
Jumped up and bit like fury;
And the progeny of Jacob
Did on the main-deck wake up,
(I wot those greasy Rabbins
Would never pay for cabins ;)
And each man moaned and jabbered in
His filthy Jewish gabardine,
In woe and lamentation,
And howling consternation.
And the splashing water drenches
Their dirty brats and wenches;
And they crawl from bales and benches,
In a hundred thousand stenches.
This was the white squall famous,
Which latterly o'ercame us,
And which all will well remember,
On the 28th September ;
When a Prussian captain of Lancers
(Those tight-laced, whiskered prancers)
Came on the deck astonished,
By that wild squall admonished,
And wondering cried, "Potz tausend,
Wie ist der Stürm jetzt brausend?"
And looked at Captain Lewis,
Who calmly stood and blew his
Cigar in all the bustle,
And scorned the tempest's tussle.
And oft we've thought hereafter
How he beat the storm to laughter;
For well he knew his vessel
With that vain wind could wrestle;
And when a wreck we thought her,
And doomed ourselves to slaughter,
How gayly he fought her,
And through the hubbub brought her,
And as the tempest caught her,
Cried, "George, some brandy and water!"
WE were crowded in the cabin,
Not a soul would dare to sleep,-
It was midnight on the waters
And a storm was on the deep.
'T is a fearful thing in winter
To be shattered by the blast, And to hear the rattling trumpet Thunder, "Cut away the mast!"
So we shuddered there in silence,
For the stoutest held his breath, While the hungry sea was roaring, And the breakers talked with Death.
As thus we sat in darkness,
Each one busy in his prayers, "We are lost!" the captain shouted As he staggered down the stairs.
LOUD roared the dreadful thunder,
The rain a deluge showers,
The clouds were rent asunder
By lightning's vivid powers;
The night both drear and dark,
Our poor devoted bark, Till next day, there she lay,
In the Bay of Biscay, O!
Now dashed upon the billow,
Our opening timbers creak,
Each fears a watery pillow,
None stops the dreadful leak; To cling to slippery shrouds
Each breathless seaman crowds, As she lay, till the day, In the Bay of Biscay, O!
At length the wished-for morrow Broke through the hazy sky, Absorbed in silent sorrow,
Each heaved a bitter sigh; The dismal wreck to view Struck horror to the crew, As she lay, on that day,
In the Bay of Biscay, O!
Her yielding timbers sever,
Her pitchy seams are rent, When Heaven, all bounteous ever, Its boundless mercy sent, A sail in sight appears;
We hail her with three cheers; Now we sail, with the gale, From the Bay of Biscay, O!
CEASE, rude Boreas, blustering railer!
List, ye landsmen, all to me,
Messmates, hear a brother sailor
Sing the dangers of the sea;
From bounding billows, first in motion,
When the distant whirlwinds rise,
To the tempest-troubled ocean,
Where the seas contend with skies.
Hark! the boatswain hoarsely bawling,
By topsail sheets and halyards stand !
Down top-gallants quick be hauling!
Down your stay-sails, hand, boys, hand!
Now it freshens, set the braces,
Quick the topsail sheets let go; Luff, boys, luff! don't make wry faces, Up your topsails nimbly clew.
Round us roars the tempest louder, Think what fear our minds inthralls! Harder yet, it yet blows harder,
Now again the boatswain calls.
The topsail yard point to the wind, boys,
See all clear to reef each course;
Let the fore sheet go, don't mind, boys,
Though the weather should be worse.
Fore and aft the sprit-sail yard get,
Reef the mizzen, see all clear;
Hands up each preventive brace set!
Man the fore yard, cheer, lads, cheer!
Now the dreadful thunder 's roaring
Peal on peal contending clash,
On our heads fierce rain falls pouring,
In our eyes blue lightnings flash.
Sir Ralph, the rover, sailed
He scoured the seas for many a day;
And now, grown rich with plundered store,
His steers his course to Scotland's shore.
So thick a haze o'erspreads the sky
They could not see the sun on high;
The wind had blown a gale all day;
At evening it hath died away.
On the deck the rover takes his stand;
So dark it is they see no land.
Quoth Sir Ralph, "It will be lighter soon,
For there is the dawn of the rising moon.'
"Canst hear," said one, "the breakers roar? For yonder, methinks, should be the shore. Now where we are I cannot tell,
But I wish we could hear the Inchcape bell."
They hear no sound; the swell is strong;
Though the wind hath fallen, they drift along;
Till the vessel strikes with a shivering shock, -
Alas! it is the Inchcape rock!
Sir Ralph, the rover, tore his hair
He beat himself in wild despair.
The waves rush in on every side ;
The ship is sinking beneath the tide.
|