There was one
Myself had idly scratched away one dawn,
One mad May-dawn, three hundred years ago,
When out of the woods we came with hawthorn boughs
And found the doors locked, as they seemed to-night.
Three hundred years ago—nay, Time was dead!
No need to scan the sign-board any more
Where that white-breasted siren of the sea
Curled her moon-silvered tail among such rocks
As never in the merriest seaman's tale
Broke the blue-bliss of fabulous lagoons
Beyond the Spanish Main.
And, through the dream,
Even as I stood and listened, came a sound
Of clashing wine-cups: then a deep-voiced song
Made the old timbers of the Mermaid Inn
Shake as a galleon shakes in a gale of wind
When she rolls glorying through the Ocean-sea.
Song
I
Marchaunt Adventurers, chanting at the windlass,
Early in the morning, we slipped from Plymouth Sound,
All for Adventure in the great New Regions,
All for Eldorado and to sail the world around!
Sing! the red of sun-rise ripples round the bows again.
Marchaunt Adventurers, O sing, we're outward bound,
All to stuff the sunset in our old black galleon,
All to seek the merchandise that no man ever found.
Chorus: Marchaunt Adventurers!
Marchaunt Adventurers!
Marchaunt Adventurers, O, whither are ye bound?—
All for Eldorado and the great new Sky-line,
All to seek the merchandise that no man ever found.
II
Marchaunt Adventurers, O, what'ull ye bring home again?—
Wonders and works and the thunder of the sea!
Whom will ye traffic with?—The King of the Sunset!
What shall be your pilot then?—A wind from Galilee.
Nay, but ye be marchaunts, will ye come back empty-handed?—
Ay, we be marchaunts, though our gain we ne'er shall see.
Cast we now our bread upon the waste wild waters.
After many days, it shall return with usury.
Chorus: Marchaunt Adventurers!
Marchaunt Adventurers!