A lamb, the loveliest of the flock,
To your disheartened crew I gave,
Life to sustain on yonder deep—
Sighing, I cast one sorrowing look
When on the margin of the main
You slew the loveliest of my sheep.
Along your native northern shores,
From cape to cape, where'er you stray,
Of all the nymphs that catch the eye,
They scarce can be excelled by our's—
Not in more fragrant shades they play;—
The summer suns come not so nigh.
Confess your fault, mistaken swain,
And own, at least, our equal charms—
Have you no flowers of ruddy hue,
That please your fancy on the plain?—
Would you not guard those flowers from harm,
If Nature's self each picture drew!
Vain are your sighs—in vain your tears,
Your barque must still at anchor lay,
And you remain a slave to care;
A thousand doubts, a thousand fears,
'Till what you said, you shall unsay,
Bermudian damsels are not fair!
[380] First published in the New York Daily Advertiser, Sept. 7, 1790, under the title, "Written at Cape Hatteras," and dated June, 1789. The last line of this version reads, "Hatteras maidens are not fair." It was republished in the National Gazette, March 19, 1792, under the title "Tormentina's Complaint," and dated "Castle Island, Bermuda, Jan. 20, 1789." In the 1809 edition, the text of which I have followed, it was grouped with the Amanda poems.
HATTERAS[381]
In fathoms five the anchor gone;
While here we furl the sail,
No longer vainly labouring on
Against the western gale:
While here thy bare and barren cliffs,
O Hatteras, I survey,
And shallow grounds and broken reefs—
What shall console my stay!
The dangerous shoal, that breaks the wave
In columns to the sky;
The tempests black, that hourly rave,
Portend all danger nigh:
Sad are my dreams on ocean's verge!
The Atlantic round me flows,
Upon whose ancient angry surge
No traveller finds repose!
The Pilot comes!—from yonder sands
He shoves his barque, so frail,
And hurrying on, with busy hands,
Employs both oar and sail.
Beneath this rude unsettled sky
Condemn'd to pass his years,
No other shores delight his eye,
No foe alarms his fears.