Ocean with ether blending.
And, hark! once more that lengthened roar,
As from his spout-hole gushing,
His breath, long spent, now finds a vent,
Like steam from boiler rushing.
It does not seem that a poet who could write so vividly and forcefully as this ought to be without a place in American literature, even if there were no other interest in his work.
There is another whaling song, entitled The Coast of Peru, and undoubtedly the work of a forecastle poet, which is worth preserving, despite its homeliness, for its genuine flavor, and as a relic of the old days before steam whalers and bomb lances took so much of the romance out of the fishery.