Tacking Ship off Shore.

THE weather-leech of the topsail shivers,

The bowlines strain, and the lee-shrouds slacken, The braces are taut, the lithe boom quivers,

And the waves with the coming squall-cloud blacken.

Open one point on the weather-bow,

Is the light-house tall on Fire Island Head? There's a shade of doubt on the captain's brow, And the pilot watches the heaving lead.

I stand at the wheel, and with eager eye
To sea and to sky and to shore I gaze,
Till the muttered order of "Full and by!"
Is suddenly changed for "Full for stays!"

The ship bends lower before the breeze,
As her broadside fair to the blast she lays;
And she swifter springs to the rising seas,

As the pilot calls, "Stand by for stays!"

It is silence all, as each in his place,

With the gathered coil in his hardened hands, By tack and bowline, by sheet and brace,

Waiting the watchword impatient stands.

And the light on Fire Island Head draws near,

As, trumpet-winged, the pilot's shout From his post on the bowsprit's heel I hear, With the welcome call of "Ready! About!"

No time to spare! It is touch and go;

And the captain growls, "Down, helm! hard down!"

As my weight on the whirling spokes I throw, While heaven grows black with the storm-cloud's frown.

High o'er the knight-heads flies the spray,

As we meet the shock of the plunging sea; And my shoulder stiff to the wheel 1 lay, As I answer, "Ay, ay, sir! Ha-a-rd a-lee!"

With the swerving leap of a startled steed
The ship flies fast in the eye of the wind,

The dangerous shoals on the lee recede,

And the headland white we have left behind.

The topsails flutter, the jibs collapse,

And belly and tug at the groaning cleats; The spanker slats, and the mainsail flaps ; And thunders the order, "Tacks and sheets!"

'Mid the rattle of blocks and the tramp of the crew, Hisses the rain of the rushing squall:

The sails are aback from clew to clew,

And now is the moment for, "Mainsail, haul!”

And the heavy yards, like a baby's toy,

By fifty strong arms are swiftly swung: She holds her way, and I look with joy For the first white spray o'er the bulwarks flung.

"Let go, and haul!" "Tis the last command, And the head-sails fill to the blast once more: Astern and to leeward lies the land,

With its breakers white on the shingly shore.

What matters the reef, or the rain, or the squall?
I steady the helm for the open sea;
The first mate clamors, "Belay, there, all!"

And the captain's breath once more comes free.
And so off shore let the good ship fly;
Little care I how the gusts may blow,
In my fo'castle bunk, in a jacket dry,
Eight bells have struck, and my watch is below.
WALTER MITCHELL.

The Sea.

THE sea! the sea! the open sea!
The blue, the fresh, the ever free!
Without a mark, without a bound,

It runneth the earth's wide regions round;
It plays with the clouds; it mocks the skies;
Or like a cradled creature lies.

I'm on the sea! I'm on the sea!

I am where I would ever be;

With the blue above, and the blue below,
And silence wheresoe'er I go:

If a storm should come and awake the deep,
What matter? I shall ride and sleep.

I love, oh how I love to ride

On the fierce, foaming, bursting tide,

Twilight.

THE twilight is sad and cloudy;
The wind blows wild and free;
And like the wings of sea-birds
Flash the white caps of the sea.

But in the fisherman's cottage
There shines a ruddier light,
And a little face at the window
Peers out into the night;

Close, close it is pressed to the window,

As if those childish eyes

Were looking into the darkness,
To see some form arise.

And a woman's waving shadow
Is passing to and fro,
Now rising to the ceiling,

Now bowing and bending low.

What tale do the roaring ocean

And the night-wind, bleak and wild, As they beat at the crazy casement, Tell to that little child?

And why do the roaring ocean,

And the night-wind, wild and bleak, As they beat at the heart of the mother, Drive the color from her cheek?

HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW.

Storm Song.

THE clouds are scudding across the moon;
A misty light is on the sea;
The wind in the shrouds has a wintry tune,
And the foam is flying free.

Brothers, a night of terror and gloom

Speaks in the cloud and gathering roar; Thank God, He has given us broad sea-room, A thousand miles from shore.

Down with the hatches on those who sleep!
The wild and whistling deck have we;
Good watch, my brothers, to-night we'll keep,
While the tempest is on the sea!

THE night is made for cooling shade, For silence, and for sleep;

And when I was a child, I laid

My hands upon my breast, and prayed,
And sank to slumbers deep:

Childlike as then I lie to-night,
And watch my lonely cabin-light.

Each movement of the swaying lamp
Shows how the vessel reels;
As o'er her deck the billows tramp,
And all her timbers strain and cramp
With every shock she feels,

It starts and shudders, while it burns,
And in its hinged socket turns.

Now swinging slow and slanting low,
It almost level lies;

And yet I know, while to and fro
I watch the seeming pendule go
With restless fall and rise,
The steady shaft is still upright,
Poising its little globe of light.

O hand of God! O lamp of peace!
O promise of my soul!
Though weak, and tossed, and ill at ease,
Amid the roar of smiting seas,

The ship's convulsive roll,

I own with love and tender awe

Yon perfect type of faith and law.

From the tumbling surf that buries

The Orkneyan skerries, Answering the hoarse Hebrides; And from wrecks of ships, and drifting

Spars, uplifting

On the desolate, rainy seas;

Ever drifting, drifting, drifting
On the shifting

Currents of the restless main;

Till in sheltered coves, and reaches Of sandy beaches,

All have found repose again.

So when storms of wild emotion
Strike the ocean

Of the poet's soul, ere long,
From each cave and rocky fastness

In its vastness,

Floats some fragment of a song:

From the far-off isles enchanted Heaven has planted

With the golden fruit of truth;

From the flashing surf whose vision Gleams Elysian

In the tropic clime of Youth;

From the strong will, and the endeavor
That for ever

Wrestles with the tides of fate;
From the wreck of hopes far-scattered,
Tempest-shattered,

Floating waste and desolate;

Ever drifting, drifting, drifting
On the shifting

Currents of the restless heart;
Till at length in books recorded,
They, like hoarded

Household words, no more depart.
HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW.

Gulf-Weed.

A WEARY weed, tossed to and fro, Drearily drenched in the ocean brine, Soaring high and sinking low,

Lashed along without will of mine; Sport of the spoom of the surging sea; Flung on the foam, afar and anear, Mark my manifold mystery,

Growth and grace in their place appear.

I bear round berries, gray and red,
Rootless and rover though I be;
My spangled leaves, when nicely spread,
Arboresce as a trunkless tree;
Corals curious coat me o'er,

White and hard in apt array;
Mid the wild waves' rude uproar,
Gracefully grow I, night and day.

Hearts there are on the sounding shore,
Something whispers soft to me,
Restless and roaming for evermore,

Like this weary weed of the sea;

Bear they yet on each beating breast

The eternal type of the wondrous wholeGrowth unfolding amidst unrest,

Grace informing with silent soul.

CORNELIUS GEORGE FENNER.

On a Picture of Peel Castle in a Storm.

I was thy neighbor once, thou rugged pile !
Four summer weeks I dwelt in sight of
thee:

I saw thee every day; and all the while
Thy form was sleeping on a glassy sea.

So pure the sky, so quiet was the air,

So like, so very like was day to day, Whene'er I looked, thy image still was there; It trembled, but it never passed away.

How perfect was the calm! It seemed no sleep,

No mood which season takes away or brings:
I could have fancied that the mighty Deep
Was even the gentlest of all gentle things.

Ah! then if mine had been the painter's hand To express what then I saw, and add the gleam,

The light that never was on sea or land,

The consecration, and the poet's dream,

I would have planted thee, thou hoary pile, Amid a world how different from this! Beside a sea that could not cease to smile, On tranquil land, beneath a sky of bliss.

A picture had it been of lasting ease,

Elysian quiet without toil or strife; No motion but the moving tide, a breeze, Or merely silent Nature's breathing life.

Such, in the fond illusion of my heart,

Such picture would I at that time have made; And seen the soul of truth in every part,

A steadfast peace that might not be betrayed.

So once it would have been ;-'tis so no more;
I have submitted to a new control;
A power is gone, which nothing can restore;
A deep distress hath humanized my soul.

Not for a moment could I now behold

A smiling sea, and be what I have been; The feeling of my loss will ne'er be old;

This, which I know, I speak with mind serene.

Then, Beaumont, friend! who would have been the friend,

If he had lived, of him whom I deplore,
This work of thine I blame not, but commend;
This sea in anger, and that dismal shore.

O'tis a passionate work!—yet wise and well,
Well chosen is the spirit that is here:
That hulk which labors in the deadly swell,
This rueful sky, this pageantry of fear!

And this huge castle, standing here sublime,
I love to see the look with which it braves,
Cased in the unfeeling armor of old time,
The lightning, the fierce wind, and trampling

waves.

Farewell, farewell, the heart that lives alone, Housed in a dream at distance from the kind! Such happiness, wherever it be known,

Is to be pitied; for 'tis surely blind.

But welcome, fortitude and patient cheer,

And frequent sights of what is to be borne, Such sights, or worse, as are before me here: Not without hope we suffer and we mourn.

WILLIAM WORDSWORTH.

The Little Beach-Bird.

THOU little bird, thou dweller by the sea,
Why takest thou its melancholy voice,
And with that boding cry
O'er the waves dost thou fly?
Oh! rather, bird, with me

Through the fair land rejoice!

Thy flitting form comes ghostly dim and pale,
As driven by a beating storm at sea;
Thy cry is weak and scared,
As if thy mates had shared
The doom of us. Thy wail-

What does it bring to me?

Thou call'st along the sand, and haunt'st the surge, Restless and sad; as if, in strange accord

With the motion and the roar

Of waves that drive to shore,

One spirit did ye urge

The Mystery-the Word.