And the pearl shells’ spangle the flinty snow;

And from coral rocks the sea-plants lift

Their boughs where the tides and billows flow,

The water is calm and still below.

For the winds and waves are absent there;

And the sands are bright as the stars that glow

In the motionless fields of upper air.

And life in rare and beautiful forms,

Is sporting amid those bowers of stone,

And is safe, when the wrathful spirit of storms,