The Children's Garland from the Best Poets Part 14

'O father! I hear the sound of guns, O say, what may it be?'

'Some ship in distress that cannot live In such an angry sea!'

'O father! I see a gleaming light, O say, what may it be?'

But the father answered never a word,-- A frozen corpse was he.

Lashed to the helm, all stiff and stark, With his face turn'd to the skies, The lantern gleam'd through the gleaming snow On his fixed and gla.s.sy eyes.

Then the maiden clasped her hands and prayed That saved she might be; And she thought of Christ who stilled the waves On the Lake of Galilee.

And fast through the midnight dark and drear, Through the whistling sleet and snow, Like a sheeted ghost the vessel swept T'wards the reef of Norman's Woe.

And ever the fitful gusts between A sound came from the land; It was the sound of the trampling surf On the rocks and the hard sea-sand.

The breakers were right beneath her bows, She drifted a dreary wreck, And a whooping billow swept the crew Like icicles from her deck.

She struck where the white and fleecy waves Look'd soft as carded wool, But the cruel rocks they gored her sides Like the horns of an angry bull.

Her rattling shrouds all sheathed in ice, With the masts went by the board; Like a vessel of gla.s.s she stove and sank, Ho! ho! the breakers roared.

At day-break on the bleak sea-beach, A fisherman stood aghast, To see the form of a maiden fair Lashed close to a drifting mast.

The salt sea was frozen on her breast, The salt tears in her eyes; And he saw her hair like the brown sea-weed, On the billows fall and rise.

Such was the wreck of the _Hesperus_, In the midnight and the snow; Heav'n save us all from a death like this, On the reef of Norman's Woe!

_H. W. Longfellow_

XLVI

_A CANADIAN BOAT SONG_

Faintly as tolls the evening chime, Our voices keep tune and our oars keep time.

Soon as the woods on the sh.o.r.e look dim, We'll sing at St. Anne's our parting hymn.

Row, brothers, row, the stream runs fast, The Rapids are near and the daylight's past.

Why should we yet our sail unfurl?

There is not a breath the blue wave to curl; But when the wind blows off the sh.o.r.e, Oh! sweetly we'll rest our weary oar.

Blow, breezes, blow, the stream runs fast, The Rapids are near and the daylight's past.

Utawas' tide! this trembling moon Shall see us float over thy surges soon.

Saint of this green isle! hear our prayers, Oh, grant us cool heavens, and favouring airs.

Blow, breezes, blow, the stream runs fast, The Rapids are near and the daylight's past.

_T. Moore_

XLVII

_ROSABELLE_

O listen, listen, ladies gay!

No haughty feat of arms I tell; Soft is the note, and sad the lay, That mourns the lovely Rosabelle.

'Moor, moor the barge, ye gallant crew, And gentle lady, deign to stay!

Rest thee in Castle Ravensheuch, Nor tempt the stormy firth to-day.

'The blackening wave is edged with white; To inch and rock the sea-mews fly; The fishers have heard the Water-Sprite, Whose screams forbode that wreck is nigh.

'Last night the gifted seer did view A wet shroud swathed round lady gay; Then stay thee, Fair, in Ravensheuch; Why cross the gloomy firth to-day?'

''Tis not because Lord Lindesay's heir To-night at Roslin leads the ball, But that my lady-mother there Sits lonely in her castle hall.

''Tis not because the ring they ride, And Lindesay at the ring rides well, But that my sire the wine will chide If 'tis not fill'd by Rosabelle.'

--O'er Roslin all that dreary night A wondrous blaze was seen to gleam; 'Twas broader than the watch-fires' light, And redder than the bright moonbeam.

It glared on Roslin's castled rock, It ruddied all the copse-wood glen; 'Twas seen from Dryden's groves of oak, And seen from cavern'd Hawthornden.

Seem'd all on fire that chapel proud Where Roslin's chiefs uncoffin'd lie, Each Baron, for a sable shroud, Sheath'd in his iron panoply.

Seem'd all on fire within, around, Deep sacristy and altar's pale; Shone every pillar foliage-bound, And glimmer'd all the dead men's mail.

Blazed battlement and pinnet high, Blazed every rose-carved b.u.t.tress fair-- So still they blaze, when fate is nigh The lordly line of high St. Clair.

There are twenty of Roslin's barons bold Lie buried within that proud chapelle; Each one the holy vault doth hold, But the sea holds lovely Rosabelle!

And each St. Clair was buried there With candle, with book, and with knell; But the sea-caves rung, and the wild winds sung, The dirge of lovely Rosabelle.

_Sir W. Scott_

XLVIII

_THE BALLAD OF THE BOAT_

The stream was smooth as gla.s.s, we said, 'Arise and let's away:'

The Siren sang beside the boat that in the rushes lay; And spread the sail, and strong the oar, we gaily took our way.

When shall the sandy bar be cross'd? when shall we find the bay?