Look, how a horse, made mad with fear,
Disdains his careful guide;
So now the headlong headstrong boat,
Unmanaged, turns aside,
And straight presents her reeling flank
Against the swelling tide!
XIX.
The gusty wind assaults the sail;
Her ballast lies a-lee!
The sheet’s to windward taught and stiff!
Oh! the Lively—where is she?
Her capsiz’d keel is in the foam,
Her pennon’s in the sea!
XX.
The wild gull, sailing overhead,
Three times beheld emerge
The head of that bold mariner,
And then she screamed his dirge!
For he had sunk within his grave,
Lapp’d in a shroud of surge!
XXI.
The ensuing wave, with horrid foam,
Rush’d o’er and cover’d all,—
The jolly boatman’s drowning scream
Was smother’d by the squall,—
Heaven never heard his cry, nor did
The ocean heed his caul.
THE DEMON-SHIP.
’Twas off the Wash—the sun went down—the sea looked black and grim,
For stormy clouds, with murky fleece, were mustering at the brim;
Titanic shades! enormous gloom!—as if the solid night
Of Erebus rose suddenly to seize upon the light!
It was a time for mariners to bear a wary eye,
With such a dark conspiracy between the sea and sky!