Page:Notes by the Way.djvu/22

 THE SEA BY MOONLIGHT.

The setting sun had sunk beneath the tide,
 * And, glittering in her starry diadem,

The silver crescent, like an Eastern bride,
 * As fair, as pure, as the bright diamond gem,
 * Unveiled her lovely head; the billows hem,

With glittering spray and foam, the rocky shore,
 * Whose beetling crags the gathering waters stem,

Which, fretting, break with wild tumultuous roar, While towards the azure Heavens their crested summits soar.

Hark! o'er the moonlit waters borne along—
 * Now loud, now soft, as swells or dies the gale—

Rises some lone advent'rer's distant song,
 * Blending with the hoarse sea-birds' dismal wail,
 * Singing, as 'neath the moonbeams glistening pale,

His little skiff dances along the sea,
 * The scattered spray kissing her snowy sail,

The waters' wide waste heaving on her lee, While the young Rover sings, exulting, careless, free.

And now she nears the shore: upon the prow,
 * With youth elate, the daring sailor stands;

Fair hope sits laughing on his open brow;
 * He grasps her cable in his manly hands,
 * He feels her keel graze on the shelving sands;

A moment more, and from the deck he springs,
 * And on the yielding beach in safety lands;

Then his frail bark far on the shore he brings, And, to beguile his task, still cheerfully he sings.

But now his strain in distance dies away;
 * All human sounds have ceased, and peaceful sleep

Enwraps the smiling scene, save where, in play,
 * The calmed billows of the surging deep
 * Responsive whisper to the winds, that sweep

Along the sea, or in the briny tide
 * The hoarse sea-mews their glossy plumage steep,

And, gaily sporting, onward now they glide, Like a swift arrow's flight across the waters wide.

Can there be one whose spirit will not melt,
 * Listening to the waves' wild harmony?

Nor feel a charm he n'er before has felt—
 * A wild ecstatic pleasure through him fly—
 * Thrill every nerve, and chain his wondering eye

Unto the spot, and, gazing on this scene,
 * Viewing the placid ocean rearing high

Her billowy breast, unmoved the waves has seen Foam on the sea-girt coast, and scatter wide their sheen?