"The other day?" The sailor's eyes
Stood open with a great surprise:
"The other day? the 'Swan'?"
His heart began in his throat to rise.
"Ay, ay, sir, here in the cupboard lies
The jacket he had on."
"And so your lad is gone?"
"Gone with the 'Swan'?"—"And did she stand
With her anchor clutching hold of the sand
For a month, and never stir?"
"Why, to be sure! I've seen from the land,
Like a lover kissing his lady's hand,
The wild sea kissing her,—
A sight to remember, sir!"
"But, my good mother, do you know
All this was twenty years ago?
I stood on the 'Gray Swan's' deck,
And to that lad I saw you throw,
Taking it off as it might be,—so!—
The kerchief from your neck."
"Ay, and he'll bring it back!"
"And did the little lawless lad,
That has made you sick and made you sad,
Sail with the 'Gray Swan's' crew?"
"Lawless! The man is going mad!
The best boy ever mother had!—
Be sure he sailed with the crew!
What would you have him do?"
"And has he never written line,
Nor sent you word, nor made you sign,
To say he was alive?"
"Hold! If 'twas wrong, the wrong is mine;
Besides, he may lie in the brine;
And could he write from the grave?
Tut, man! what would you have?"
"Gone twenty years,—a long, long cruise!
'Twas wicked thus your love to abuse!
But if the lad still live,
And come back home, think you you can
Forgive him?" "Miserable man!
You're mad as the sea, you rave!
What have I to forgive?"
The sailor twitched his shirt so blue,
And from within his bosom drew
The kerchief. She was wild.
"O God, my Father! is it true?
My little lad, my Elihu!
My blessed boy, my child!
My dead, my living child!"
Alice Cary.
The Wreck of the Hesperus
It was the schooner Hesperus
That sailed the wintry sea;
And the skipper had taken his little daughtèr
To bear him company.