They could no help afford, but gaze with wan and troubled eye!
A flap, a flash, the green roll dashed, and laughed against the red;
Upon our boards, now here, now there, it knocked its foamy head.
The dun bowed whilk in the abyss, as on the galley bore,
Gave a tap upon her gunwale and a slap upon her floor.
She could have split a slender straw—so clean and so well she went—
As still obedient to the helm her stately course she bent.
We watched the big beast eat the small—the small beast nimbly fly,
And listen to the plunging eels—the sea-gulls’ clang on high—
We had no other music to cheer us on our way