Dauber: A Poem

A POEM
JOHN MASEFIELD
AUTHOR OF THE EVERLASTING MERCY, ETC.
LONDON WILLIAM HEINEMANN
Copyright, 1913 New Impressions, 1913 and 1914
TO MY WIFE
NOTE.—I thank the editor and proprietors of the English Review for permitting me to reprint this poem, which first appeared in their issue for October, 1912.
The persons and events described in this poem are entirely imaginary, and no reference is made or intended to any living person.

Four bells were struck, the watch was called on deck, All work aboard was over for the hour, And some men sang and others played at check, Or mended clothes or watched the sunset glower. The bursting west was like an opening flower, And one man watched it till the light was dim, But no one went across to talk to him.
He was the painter in that swift ship's crew— Lampman and painter—tall, a slight-built man, Young for his years, and not yet twenty-two; Sickly, and not yet brown with the sea's tan. Bullied and damned at since the voyage began, Being neither man nor seaman by his tally, He bunked with the idlers just abaft the galley.
His work began at five; he worked all day, Keeping no watch and having all night in. His work was what the mate might care to say; He mixed red lead in many a bouilli tin; His dungarees were smeared with paraffin. Go drown himself his round-house mates advised him, And all hands called him Dauber and despised him.