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As black as night-they turned to white, and cast against the cloud

A snowy sheet, as if each surge upturned a sailor's shroud: Still flew my boat; alas! alas! her course was nearly run! Behold yon fatal billow rise-ten billows heaped in one! With fearful speed the dreary mass came rolling, rolling fast, As if the scooping sea contained one only wave, at last! Still on it came, with horrid roar, a swift-pursuing grave; It seemed as though some cloud had turned its hugeness to a wave!

Its briny sleet began to beat beforehand in my face

I felt the rearward keel begin to climb its swelling base!
I saw its Alpine hoary head impending over mine!
Another pulse, and down it rushed, an avalanche of brine !
Brief pause had I, on God to cry, or think of wife and home;
The waters closed- and when I shrieked, I shrieked below
the foam!

Beyond that rush I have no hint of any after deed-
For I was tossing on the waste, as senseless as a weed.

"Where am I? in the breathing world, or in the world of death?"

With sharp and sudden pang I drew another birth of breath;
My eyes drank in a doubtful light, my ears a doubtful sound,
And was that ship a real ship whose tackle seemed around?

A moon, as if the earthly moon, was shining up aloft;
But were those beams the very beams that I had seen so oft?
A face that mocked the human face before me watched alone;
But were those eyes the eyes of man that looked against
my own?

O! never may the moon again disclose me such a sight As met my gaze, when first I looked on that accursed night!

I've seen a thousand horrid shapes begot of fierce extremes Of fever; and most frightful things have haunted in my dreams

Hyenas, cats, blood-loving bats, and apes with hateful stare Pernicious snakes, and shaggy bulls, the lion and she-bear, Strong enemies, with Judas looks, of treachery and spite Detested features, hardly dimmed and banished by the light! Pale-sheeted ghosts, with gory locks, upstarting from their tombs

All fantasies and images that flit in midnight glooms

Hags, goblins, demons, lemures, have made me all aghast,But nothing like that GRIMLY ONE who stood beside the mast!

His cheek was black- - his brow was black-his

hair as dark:

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eyes and

His hand was black, and where it touched it left a sable

mark;

His throat was black, his vest the same and when I looked

beneath,

His breast was black-all, all was black, except his grinning teeth.

His sooty crew were like in hue, as black as Afric slaves! O, horror! e'en the ship was black that ploughed the inky

waves!

"Alas!" I cried, "for love of truth and blessed mercy's sake,
Where am I? in what dreadful ship? upon what dreadful lake?
What shape is that, so very grim, and black as any coal?
It is Mahound, the Evil One, and he has gained my soul !
O, mother dear! my tender nurse! dear meadows that
beguiled

My happy days, when I was yet a little sinless child,-
My mother dear - my native fields, I never more shall see :
I'm sailing in the Devil's Ship, upon the Devil's Sea!"

Loud laughed that SABLE MARINER, and loudly in return His sooty crew sent forth a laugh that rang from stem to

stern

A dozen pair of grimly cheeks were crumpled on the nonce --
As many sets of grinning teeth came shining out at once:
A dozen gloomy shapes at once enjoyed the merry fit,
With shriek and yell, and oaths as well, like demons of the Pit.
They crowed their fill, and then the Chief made answer for
the whole; -

"Our skins," said he, แ

coal;

You'll find

are black, ye see, because we carry

your mother sure enough, and see your native fields

For this here ship has picked you up- the Mary Ann of Shields!"

SPRING.

A NEW VERSION.

"Ham. The air bites shrewdly - it is very cold.
Hor. It is a nipping and an eager air."- HAMLET,

"COME, gentle Spring! ethereal mildness, come!"
O! Thomson, void of rhyme as well as reason,
How couldst thou thus poor human nature hum?
There's no such season.

The Spring! I shrink and shudder at her name!
For why, I find her breath a bitter blighter!
And suffer from her blows as if they came
From Spring the Fighter.

Her praises, then, let hardy poets sing,

And be her tuneful laureates and upholders.

Who do not feel as if they had a Spring
Poured down their shoulders!

Let others eulogize her floral shows;

From me they cannot win a single stanza. I know her blooms are in full blow

The Influenza.

and so 's

Her cowslips, stocks, and lilies of the vale,

Her honey-blossoms that you hear the bees at, Her pansies, daffodils, and primrose pale,

Are things I sneeze at !

Fair is the vernal quarter of the year!

. And fair its early buddings and its blowings-
But just suppose Consumption's seeds appear
With other sowings!

For me, I find, when eastern winds are high,
A frigid, not a genial inspiration;
Nor can, like Iron-Chested Chubb, defy
An inflammation.

Smitten by breezes from the land of plague,
To me all vernal luxuries are fables,
O! where's the Spring in a rheumatic leg,
Stiff as a table's?

I limp in agony,- I wheeze and cough;
And quake with Ague, that great Agitator:
Nor dream, before July, of leaving off
My Respirator.

What wonder if in May itself I lack

A peg for laudatory verse to hang on? Spring mild and gentle ! - yes, a Spring-heeled Jack To those he sprang on.

In short, whatever panegyrics lie

In fulsome odes too many to be cited, The tenderness of Spring is all my eye, And that is blighted!

FAITHLESS NELLY GRAY.

A PATHETIC BALLAD.

BEN BATTLE was a soldier bold,
And used to war's alarms;
But a cannon-ball took off his legs,
So he laid down his arms!

Now, as they bore him off the field,
Said he, "Let others shoot,
For here I leave my second leg,
And the Forty-second Foot!"
The army-surgeons made him limbs:
Said he, "They're only pegs :
But there's as wooden members quite
As represent my legs!"

Now, Ben he loved a pretty maid,
Her name was Nelly Gray;
So he went to pay her his devours,
When he devoured his pay!

But when he called on Nelly Gray,
She made him quite a scoff;

And when she saw his wooden legs,
Began to take them off!

"O, Nelly Gray! O, Nelly Gray
Is this your love so warm?
The love that loves a scarlet coat
Should be more uniform!

Said she, "I loved a soldier once
For he was blithe and brave;
But I will never have a man

With both legs in the grave'

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