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268          ELIZABETH OAKES SMITH.

Her prow swells up from the yeasty deep,
Where it plunged in foam and spray;
And the glad waves gathering round her sweep
And bouy her in their play.

Thou wert nobly rear'd, O heart of oak!
In the sound of the ocean roar,
Where the surging wave o'er the rough rock broke
And bellow'd along the shore—
And how wilt thou in the storm rejoice,
With the wind through spar and shroud,
To hear a sound like the forest voice,
When the blast was raging loud!

With snow-white sail, and streamer gay,
She sits like an ocean-sprite,
Careering on in her trackless way,
In sunshine or dark midnight:
Her course is laid with fearless skill,
For brace hearts man the helm;
And the joyous winds her canvass fill—
Shall the wave the stout ship whelm?

On, so she goes, where icebergs roll,
Like floating cities by;
Where meteors flash by the northern pole,
And the merry dancers fly;
Where the glittering light is backward flung
From icy tower and dome,
And the frozen shrouds are gayly hung
With gems from the ocean foam.

On the Indian sea was her shadow cast, 
As it lay like molten gold,
And her pendant shroud and towering mast
Seem'd twice on the waters told.


ELIZABETH OAKES SMITH.      269

The idle canvass slowly swung
As the spicy breeze went by,
And strange, rare music around her rung
From the palm-tree growing nigh.

O, gallant ship, thou didst bear with thee
The gay and the breaking heart,
And weeping eyes look'd out to see
Thy white-spread sails depart.
And when the rattling casement told
Of many a perril'd ship,
The anxious wife her babes would fold,
And pray with trembling lip.

The petrel wheel'd in her stormy flight;
The wind piped shrill and high;
On the topmast sat a pale blue light,
That flicker'd not to the eye:
The black cloud came like a banner down,
And down came the shrieking blast;
The quivering ship on her beams is thrown,
And gone are helm and mast.

Helmless, but on before the gale,
She ploughs the deep-trough'd wave:
A gurgling sound—a phrenzied wail—
And the ship hath found a grave.
And thus is the fate of the acorn told,
That fell from the old oak tree,
And the woodland Fays in the frosty mould
Preserved for its destiny.

CHARITY, IN DESPAIR OF JUSTICE

OUT-WEARIED with the littleness and spite,
The falsehood and the treachery of men,
I cried, give me but justice, thinking then
I meekly craved a common boon which might

23*

Transcription Notes:
---------- Reopened for Editing 2023-06-29 10:45:01 ---------- Reopened for Editing 2023-06-29 10:06:28