Now horror on the souls sunk down—
On all who viewed the scene;
Twelve arctic winters then had flown,
Since this a corpse had been!
Twelve years on polar surges tossed,
By northern blasts conveyed—
Destroyed—preserved, by iron frost,
Her crew were statues made.
Perchance this fate-directed prow
Had crossed ’neath cloudless skies
The pole, which jealous Nature now
Shuts out from human eyes.
Perchance the dreamed of Northern Way
This guileless keel had plowed,
While billows with the helm did play,
And wild winds trimmed the shroud.
Say when, Stern Spirits of the North,
They found their watery grave?
Or do ye still in awful mirth,
Toss them from wave to wave?
CHAPTER X.
LIFE-SAVING MEASURES.
“ ‘O father, I hear the church-bells ring,
O say, what may it be?’
’Tis a fog-bell on a rock-bound coast,’
And he steered for the open sea.
‘O father, I hear the sound of guns,
O say, what may it be?’
‘Some ship in distress that can not live
In such an angry sea.’
‘O father, I see a gleaming light,
O say, what may it be?’
But the father answered not a word,
For a frozen corpse was he.
. . . . . . . . . .
At daybreak, on the bleak sea beach,
A fisherman stood aghast,
To see the form of a maiden fair,
Lashed close to a drifting mast.