'IN CABIN'D SHIPS, AT SEA'

Here are our thoughts,-voyagers' thoughts,

Here not the land, firm land, alone appears, may then by them be said;

The sky o'erarches here, we feel the undulating deck beneath our feet,

We feel the long pulsation-ebb and flow of endless motion; The tones of unseen mystery,—the vague and vast suggestions of the briny world,-the liquid-flowing syllables, The perfume, the faint creaking of the cordage, the melancholy rhythm,

The boundless vista, and the horizon far and dim, are all here,

And this is Ocean's poem.

Then falter not, O book! fulfil your destiny!

You, not a reminiscence of the land alone,

You too, as a lone bark, cleaving the ether-purpos'd I know not whither-yet ever full of faith,

Consort to every ship that sails,—sail you!

Bear forth to them, folded, my love—(Dear mariners! for you I fold it here in every leaf;)

Speed on, my Book! spread your white sails, my little bark, athwart the imperious waves!

Chant on,—sail on,—bear o'er the boundless blue, from me, to every shore,

This song for mariners and all their ships.

WALT WHITMAN.

Child-birth at Sea

HOU god of this great vast, rebuke these surges,

ΤΗ

Which wash both heaven and hell; and thou, that hast

Upon the winds command, bind them in brass,

Having call'd them from the deep. O! still

Thy deafening, dreadful thunders; gently quench
Thy nimble, sulphurous flashes. O! how, Lychorida,
Thou stormest venomously;

How does my queen?

Wilt thou spit all thyself? The seaman's whistle

Is as a whisper in the ears of death,
Unheard. Lychorida! Lucina, O!

Divinest patroness, and midwife gentle

To those that cry by night, convey thy deity
Aboard our dancing boat; make swift the pangs
Of my queen's travails!

A terrible childbed hast thou had, my dear;
No light, no fire: the unfriendly elements
Forgot thee utterly; nor have I time

To give thee hallow'd to thy grave, but straight
Must cast thee, scarcely coffin'd, in the ooze;
Where, for a monument upon thy bones,
And aye-remaining lamps, the belching whale
And humming water must o'erwhelm thy corpse,
Lying with simple shells!

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE.

NATURE

Sonnet

ONE lesson, Nature, let me learn of thee,

One lesson that in every wind is blown, One lesson of two duties served in one, Though the loud world proclaim their enmity— Of toil unsever'd from tranquillity: Of labour, that in still advance outgrows Far noisier schemes, accomplish'd in repose, Too great for haste, too high for rivalry. Yes, while on earth a thousand discords ring, Man's senseless uproar mingling with his toil, Still do thy sleepless ministers move on, Their glorious tasks in silence perfecting: Still working, blaming still our vain turmoil; Labourers that shall not fail, when man is gone.

MATTHEW ARNOLD.

NYMPHO LEPTOS