Page:The West Indies, and Other Poems.djvu/54

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Lives there a savage rutlcr than the slave ? — Cruel as death, insatiate as the grave, False as the winds that round his vessel blovr, Remorseless as the gulph that yawns below, Is he who toils upon the wafting flood, A Christian broker in the trade of blood ; Boisterous in speech, in action prompt and bold. He buys, he sells, — he steals, he kills, for gold. At noon, when sky and ocean, calm and clear. Bend round his bark, one blue unbroken sphere ; When dancing dolphins sparkle through the brine. And sun-beam circles o'er the waters shine ; He sees no beauty in the heaven serene. No soul-enchanting sweetness in the scene. But darkly scowling at tho glorious day. Curses the winds that loiter on their way. When swoln with hurricanes the billows rise, To meet the lightning midway from the skies ; ^\■hen from the unburthen'd hold his shrieking slaves Are cast, at midnight, to the hungry waves ;

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