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1839

She struck where the white and fleecy waves
Looked soft as carded wool,

But the cruel rocks, they gored her side
Like the horns of an angry bull.

Her rattling shrouds, all sheathed in ice,
With the masts went by the board;
Like a vessel of glass, she stove and sank,
Ho! ho! the breakers roared!

At daybreak, on the bleak sea-beach,
A fisherman stood aghast,

To see the form of a maiden fair,
Lashed close to a drifting mast.

The salt sea was frozen on her breast,

The salt tears in her eyes;

And he saw her hair, like the brown sea-weed,
On the billows fall and rise.

Such was the wreck of the Hesperus,

In the midnight and the snow!

Christ save us all from a death like this,

On the reef of Norman's Woe!

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The Skeleton in Armor1

"Speak! speak! thou fearful guest
Who, with thy hollow breast
Still in rude armor drest,

Comest to daunt me!
Wrapt not in Eastern balms,
But with thy fleshless palms
Stretched, as if asking alms,

Why dost thou haunt me?"

Then, from those cavernous eyes
Pale flashes seemed to rise,
As when the Northern skies

Gleam in December;

And, like the water's flow

1. This, like "The Wreck of the Hesperus," is an experiment in balladry. Its sources are older, representing the rough, two-beat measures of the verse of the Old English, Icelandic, .and Norse skalds, or poets (cf. 1. 19), which Longfellow had been studying, and used again in "The Saga of King Olaf." The story was Longfellow's response to the de

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bated theories that an ancient stone tower in Newport, and an "armored" skeleton unearthed and destroyed at Fall River, were relics of prehistoric Scandinavian settlement. Written in 1840, the poem appeared in the Knickerbocker Magazine for January, 1841, before being collected in Ballads and Other Poems that year.

Under December's snow,

Came a dull voice of woe

From the heart's chamber.

"I was a Viking old!
My deeds, though manifold,
No Skald in song has told,
No Saga taught thee!
Take heed, that in thy verse
Thou dost the tale rehearse,
Else dread a dead man's curse;
For this I sought thee.

"Far in the Northern Land,
By the wild Baltic's strand,
I, with my childish hand,
Tamed the gerfalcon;2

And, with my skates fast-bound,
Skimmed the half-frozen Sound,
That the poor whimpering hound
Trembled to walk on.

"Oft to his frozen lair
Tracked I the grisly bear,

While from my path the hare

Fled like a shadow;

Oft through the forest dark

Followed the were-wolf's bark,

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Measured in cups of ale,
Draining the oaken pail,
Filled to o'erflowing.

"Once as I told in glee
Tales of the stormy sea,
Soft eyes did gaze on me,
Burning yet tender;
And as the white stars shine
On the dark Norway pine,
On that dark heart of mine
Fell their soft splendor.

"I wooed the blue-eyed maid,
Yielding, yet half afraid,
And in the forest's shade

Our vows were plighted.
Under its loosened vest
Fluttered her little breast,
Like birds within their nest

By the hawk frighted.
"Bright in her father's hall
Shields gleamed upon the wall,
Loud sang the minstrels all,
Chanting his glory;

When of old Hildebrand
I asked his daughter's hand,

Mute did the minstrels stand.

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Follow the sea-mew's flight,

4. A species of European sea gull.

Why did they leave that night

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Her nest unguarded?

"Scarce had I put to sea,

Bearing the maid with me,
Fairest of all was she

Among the Norsemen!

When on the white sea-strand,

Waving his armèd hand,

Saw we old Hildebrand,

With twenty horsemen.

"Then launched they to the blast,
Bent like a reed each mast,
Yet we were gaining fast,
When the wind failed us;
And with a sudden flaw
Came round the gusty Skaw,5
So that our foe we saw
Laugh as he hailed us.

"And as to catch the gale
Round veered the flapping sail,

'Death!' was the helmsman's hail,
'Death without quarter!'

Mid-ships with iron keel
Struck we her ribs of steel;
Down her black hulk did reel
Through the black water!

"As with his wings aslant,
Sails the fierce cormorant,
Seeking some rocky haunt,

With his prey laden,—
So toward the open main,
Beating to sea again,
Through the wild hurricane,

Bore I the maiden.

"Three weeks we westward bore,
And when the storm was o'er

Cloud-like we saw the shore

Stretching to leeward;
There for my lady's bower
Built I the lofty tower,

5. The northernmost cape of Jutland, 6. I.e., the Newport tower.

Denmark.

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Which, to this very hour,
Stands looking seaward.

"There lived we many years;
Time dried the maiden's tears;
She had forgot her fears,

She was a mother;

Death closed her mild blue eyes,
Under that tower she lies;
Ne'er shall the sun arise

On such another!

"Still grew my bosom then,
Still as a stagnant fen!
Hateful to me were men,

The sunlight hateful!
In the vast forest here,
Clad in my warlike gear,
Fell I upon my spear,

Oh, death was grateful!

"Thus, seamed with many scars,
Bursting these prison bars,
Up to its native stars

My soul ascended!

There from the flowing bowl
Deep drinks the warrior's soul,
Skoal!" to the Northland! skoal!"
Thus the tale ended.

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