JOHN DAVIS, BOUCANIER

High time, high time, good gentlemen, to sail the Spanish Main!

Three months we've watched for galleons and treasure bound for Spain;

Three months! and not a vessel, neither barque nor brigantine!

No Cartagena plate-ship, or De Dios, have we seen.

Our sails are idle as the wind, our ships as gulls or waves.—

And shall inaction rot us like a gang of shackled slaves?

Up, boucaniers! the land is wide, and wider far the sea—

Somewhere between the dusk and dawn and dusk some hope must be;