Over the rail

My hand I trail

Within the shadow of the sail;
A joy intense,

The cooling sense

Glides down my drowsy indolence.

With dreamful eyes

My spirit lies

Where summer sings and never dies
O'erveiled with vines,

She glows and shines

Among her future oil and wines.

Her children, hid

The cliffs amid,

Are gambolling with the gambolling kid; Or down the walls,

With tipsy calls,

Laugh on the rocks like waterfalls.

The fisher's child,

With tresses wild,

Unto the smooth, bright sand beguiled,

With glowing lips

Sings as she skips,

Or gazes at the far-off ships.

Yon deep bark goes

Where Traffic blows,

From lands of sun to lands of snows;
This happier one,

Its course is run

From lands of snow to lands of sun.

O happy ship,

To rise and dip,

With the blue crystal at your lip!

O happy crew,

My heart with you

Sails, and sails, and sings anew!

THE CHARNEL SHIP.

THE night, the long, dark night, at last

Passed fearfully away;

'Mid crashing ice, and howling blast, They hailed the dawning day,

Which broke to cheer the whaler's crew, And wide around its gray light threw.

The storm had ceased; its wrath had rent
The icy wall asunder;

And many a piercing glance they sent
Around in awe and wonder;

And sailor hearts their rude praise gave
To God, that morn, from o'er the wave.

The breeze blew freshly, and the sun
Poured his full radiance far

On heaps of icy fragments, won,

Sad trophies, in the past night's war
Of winds and waters, and in piles
Now drifted by bright shining isles.

But lo! still farther off appears
A form more dim and dark;
And anxious eyes, and hopes, and fears
Its slow, strange progress mark.

It hastens to them, by the breeze
Borne onward from more Northern seas.

Near, and more near; and can it be, (More venturous than their own,)

A ship, whose seeming ghost they see
Among the icebergs thrown?
With broken masts, dismantled all,
And dark sails like a funeral pall?

God of the mariner! protect

Her inmates as she moves along,

Through perils, which ere now had wrecked,
But that Thine arm is strong!

Ha! she has struck! she grounds! she stands
Still, as if held by giant hands!

"Quick, man the boat!" Away they sprang,

The stranger ship to aid,

And loud their hailing voices rang,

And rapid speed they made;

But all in silence, deep, unbroke,

The vessel stood; none answering spoke.

'Twas fearful! not a sound arose,

No moving thing was there,
To interrupt the dread repose

Which filled each heart with fear.
On deck they silent stepped, and sought,
Till one, a man, their sad sight caught.

He was alone, the damp-chill mould
Of years hung on his cheek;
While the pen within his hand had told

The tale no voice might speak:

"Seventy days," the record stood,

'We have been in the ice, and wanted food!"

They took his book, and turned away,

But soon discovered where

The wife, in her death-sleep, gently lay

Near him in life most dear,

Who, seated beside his young heart's pride,
Long years before had calmly died.

Oh, wedded love! how beautiful,

How pure a thing thou art,
Whose influence e'en in death can rule,
And triumph o'er the heart;

Can cheer life's roughest walk, and shed
A holy light around the dead!

There was a solemn, sacred feeling
Kindled in every breast,

And, softly from the cabin stealing,

They left them to their rest;

The fair, the young, the constant pair,
They left them, with a blessing, there.

And to their boat returning, each
With thoughtful brow, and haste,
And o'ercharged heart, too full for speech,
They left amid that waste

The charnel ship, which, years before,

Had sailed from distant Albion's shore.

They left her in the icebergs, where

Few venture to intrude,

A monument of death and fear,

'Mid Ocean's solitude;

And, grateful for their own release,

Thanked God, and sought their homes in peace.

THE SAILOR-BOY'S DREAM.

N slumbers of midnight the sailor-boy lay,

IN

His hammock swung loose at the sport of the wind;

But, watch-worn and weary, his cares flew away,

And visions of happiness danced o'er his mind.

He dreamed of his home, of his dear native bowers, And pleasures that waited on life's merry morn; While memory stood sidewise, half-covered with flowers, And restored every rose, but secreted its thorn.