As the stars come out, and the night-wind
Brings up the stream

Murmurs and scents of the infinite sea.

B

Matthew Arnold.

A Green Wave

ETWEEN the salt sea-send before
And all the flowing gulfs behind,
Half lifted by the rising wind,
Half eager for the ungain'd shore,

A great green wave of shining light
Sweeps onward crowned with dazzling white:

Above, the east wind shreds the sky
With plumes from the grey clouds that fly.

William Sharp.

"Pater vester pascit illa

UR bark is on the waters! wide around,
The wandering wave; above, the lonely sky:
Hush! a young sea-bird floats, and that quick
cry

Shrieks to the levelled weapon's echoing sound:
Grasps its lank wing, and on, with reckless bound!
Yet, creature of the surf, a sheltering breast
To-night shall haunt in vain thy far off nest,
A call unanswered search the rocky ground.
Lord of Leviathan! when Ocean heard

Thy gathering voice, and sought his native breeze;
When whales first plunged with life, and the proud deep
Felt unborn tempests heave in troubled sleep,
Thou didst provide, even for this nameless bird,
Home, and a natural love, amid the surging seas.

R. S. Hawker.

Outward Bound

TATELY yon vessel sails adown the tide,
To some far distant land adventurous bound;
The sailors' busy cries from side to side
Pealing among the echoing rocks resound;
A patient, thoughtless, much-enduring band,

Joyful they enter on their ocean way,

With shouts exulting leave their native land,
And know no care beyond the present day.
But is there no poor mourner left behind,
Who sorrows for a child or husband there?
Who at the howling of the midnight wind
Will wake and tremble in her boding prayer?
So may her voice be heard and Heaven be kind!
Go, gallant ship, and be thy fortune fair!

Southey.

"Where lies the land?"

HERE lies the land to which the ship would go?
Far, far ahead is all her seamen know.

W

And where the land she travels from? Away,
Far, far behind, is all that they can say.

On sunny noons, upon the deck's smooth face,
Linked arm in arm, how pleasant here to pace;
Or, o'er the stern reclining, watch below
The foaming wake far-widening as we go.

On stormy nights when wild north-westers rave,
How proud a thing to fight with wind and wave!
The dripping sailor on the reeling mast
Exults to bear, and scorns to wish it past.

Where lies the land to which the ship would go?
Far, far ahead is all her seamen know.

And where the land she travels from? Away,
Far, far behind, is all that they can say.

HIPS that pass in the night, and speak each other in passing,

Only a signal shown and a distant voice in

the darkness;

So on the ocean of life we pass and speak one another,

Only a look, and a voice, then darkness again and a

silence.

Sea-farers

Longfellow.

HE steamers that put from the Clyde,
And the whalers that sail from Dundee,
Go forth in their season on top of the tide
To gather the grist of the sea,

To ply in the lanes of the sea.

By fairway and channel and sound,

By shoal and deep water they go,

Guessing the course by the feel of the ground
Or chasing the drift of the floe,

Nor'west in the track of the floe.

And we steer them to harbours afar,
At hazard we win them abroad,

Where the coral is furrowed by keels on the bar
And the sea-floor is swept by the Lord,

The anchorage dredged by the Lord.

By the placid, palm-skirted bayou,
By coasts that are drear and forlorn,
We follow the courses the Admirals drew

In the days when they doubled the Horn,
When Drake lost a month off the Horn.

And what of the cargo ye bring

For the venture ye bore overseas?
What of the treasure ye set forth to wring
At peril of billow and breeze,

In spite of the billow and breeze?

Oh! we carry the keys of the earth,
And the password of empire we bear;

Wherever the beaches held tokens of worth
We 'stablished your sovereignty there,
We planted your flag over there.

And the guerdon for blood ye have shed?
The glory that haloes your name?

Oh! a grave where the dipsey is dim overhead,
And the rudderless echo of fame,

A chip from the flotsam of fame.

Perceval Gibbon.

Lost, with her crew of three hundred boys, on the last day of her voyage, March 23, 1876. She foundered off Portsmouth, from which town many of the boys came.

U

66

P with the royals that top the white spread of her! Press her and dress her, and drive through the foam;

The Island's to port, and the mainland ahead of her,

Hey for the Warner and Hayling and Home!

Bo'sun, O Bo'sun, just look at the green of it! Look at the red cattle down by the hedge! Look at the farmsteading—all that is seen of it, One little gable end over the edge!"

"Lord! the tongues of them clattering, clattering,
All growing wild at a peep of the Wight;
Aye, sir, aye, it has set them all chattering,
Thinking of home and their mothers to-night."

Spread the topgallants-oh, lay them out lustily!
What though it darken o'er Netherby Combe?
'Tis but the valley wind, puffing so gustily-
On for the Warner and Hayling and Home!

"Bo'sun, O Bo'sun, just see the long slope of it! Culver is there, with the cliff and the light. Tell us, oh tell us, now is there a hope of it?

Shall we have leave for our homes for to-night?"