4.
Fletcher! Murray! Bob![5] where are you?
Stretched along the deck like logs—
Bear a hand, you jolly tar, you!
Here's a rope's end for the dogs.
Hobhouse muttering fearful curses,
As the hatchway down he rolls,
Now his breakfast, now his verses,
Vomits forth—and damns our souls.
"Here's a stanza[6]
On Braganza—
Help!"—"A couplet?"—"No, a cup
Of warm water—"
"What's the matter?"
"Zounds! my liver's coming up;
I shall not survive the racket
Of this brutal Lisbon Packet."
5.
Now at length we're off for Turkey,
Lord knows when we shall come back!
Breezes foul and tempests murky
May unship us in a crack.
But, since Life at most a jest is,
As philosophers allow,
Still to laugh by far the best is,
Then laugh on—as I do now.
Laugh at all things,
Great and small things,
Sick or well, at sea or shore;
While we're quaffing,
Let's have laughing—
Who the devil cares for more?—
Some good wine! and who would lack it,
Ev'n on board the Lisbon Packet?
Falmouth Roads, June 30, 1809.
[First published, Letters and Journals, 1830, i. 230-232.]
FOOTNOTES:
[3] [For Francis Hodgson (1781-1852), see Letters, 1898, i. 195, note 1.]
[4] [Compare Peter Pindar's Ode to a Margate Hoy—
"Go, beauteous Hoy, in safety ev'ry inch!
That storm should wreck thee, gracious Heav'n forbid!
Whether commanded by brave Captain Finch
Or equally tremendous Captain Kidd.">[