And the rest rubbed their eyes, and saw a bay,
Or thought they saw, and shaped their course for
For shore it was, and gradually grew

Distinct, and high, and palpable to view.

[shore,

And then of these some part burst into tears,
And others, looking with a stupid stare,
Could not yet separate their hopes from fears,
And seem'd as if they had no further care;
While a few pray'd-(the first time for some years)-
And at the bottom of the boat three were
Asleep; they shook them by the hand and head,
And tried to waken them, but found them dead.
The day before, fast sleeping on the water,

They found a turtle of the hawk's-bill kind,
And by good fortune, gliding softly, caught her,
Which yielded a day's life, and to their mind
Proved even still a more nutritious matter,
Because it left encouragement behind:
They thought, that in such perils, more than chance
Had sent them this for their deliverance.

The land appear'd a high and rocky coast,
And higher grew the mountains as they drew,
Set by a current, towards it: they were lost
In various conjectures, for none knew
To what part of the earth they had been tost,
So changeable had been the winds that blew :
Some thought it was Mount Etna, some the highlands
Of Candia, Cyprus, Rhodes, or other islands.

Meantime, the current, with a rising gale,

Still set them onwards to the welcome shore, Like Charon's bark of spectres, dull and pale: Their living freight was now reduced to four,―

And three dead, whom their strength could not avail To heave into the deep with those before;

Though the two sharks still follow'd them, and dash'd The spray into their faces as they splash'd.

Famine, despair, cold, thirst, and heat, had done Their work on them by turns, and thinned them to Such things, a mother had not known her son

Amidst the skeletons of that gaunt crew;
By night chill'd, by day scorch'd, thus one by one
They perish'd, until wither'd to these few,
But chiefly by a species of self-slaughter,
In washing down Pedrillo with salt-water.

As they drew nigh the land, which now was seen,
Unequal in its aspect here and there,
They felt the freshness of its growing green,

That waved in forest tops and smooth'd the air,
And fell upon their glazed eyes like a screen
From glistening waves, and skies so hot and bare
Lovely seem'd any object that should sweep
Away the vast, salt, dread, eternal deep.

The shore look'd wild, without a trace of man,
And girt by formidable waves; but they
Were mad for land, and thus their course they ran,
Though right ahead the roaring breakers lay:
A reef between them also now began

To show its boiling surf and bounding spray,
But finding no place for their landing better,
They ran the boat for shore, and overset her.

SOLITUDE.

To sit on rocks, to muse o'er flood and fell,
To slowly trace the forest's shady scene,

Where things that own not man's dominion dwell, And mortal foot hath ne'er or rarely been; To climb the trackless mountain all unseen, With the wild flock that never needs a fold; Alone o'er steeps and foaming falls to lean; This is not solitude; 'tis but to hold [unroll'd. Converse with Nature's charms, and view her stores

But 'midst the crowd, the hum, the shock of men, To hear, to see, to feel, and to possess,

And roam along, the world's tired denizen, With none who bless us, none whom we can bless, Minions of splendour shrinking from distress! None that, with kindred consciousness endued, If we were not, would seem to smile the less Of all that flatter'd, follow'd, sought, and sued; This is to be alone; this, this is solitude!

A SOUTH SEA FEMALE.

There sat the gentle savage of the wild,
In growth a woman, though in years a child,
As childhood dates within our colder clime,
Where nought is ripened rapidly save crime;
The infant of an infant world, as pure

From Nature-lovely, warm, and premature;
Dusky like night, but night with all her stars,
Or cavern sparkling with its native spars;
With eyes that were a language and a spell,
A form like Aphrodite's in a shell!
With all her loves around her on the deep,
Voluptuous as the first approach of sleep;
Yet full of life-for through her tropic cheek
The blush would make its way, and all but speak;
The sun-born blood suffused her neck, and threw
O'er her clear nut-brown skin a lucid hue,

Like coral reddening through the darken'd wave,
Which draws the diver to the crimson cave.
Such was this daughter of the Southern Seas,
Herself a billow in her energies,

To bear the bark of other's happiness,
Nor feel a sorrow till their joy grew less:
Her wild and warm yet faithful bosom knew
No joy like what it gave, her hopes ne'er drew
Aught from experience, that chill touchstone, whose
Sad proof reduces all things from their hues :
She fear'd no ill, because she knew it not,

Or what she knew was soon-too soon-forgot;
Her smiles and tears had passed, as light winds pass
O'er lakes, to ruffle, not destroy, their glass,
Whose depths unsearch'd, and fountains from the hill,
Restore their surface, in itself so still,

Until the earthquake tear the Naiad's cave,
Root up the spring, and trample on the wave,
And crush the living waters to a mass,
The amphibious desert of the dank morass!
And must their fate be hers? The eternal change
But grasps humanity with quicker range;

And they who fall, but fall as worlds will fall,
To rise, if just, a spirit o'er them all.

Rapt in the fond forgetfulness of life,
Neuha, the South Sea girl, was all a wife,
With no distracting world to call her off
From love; with no society to scoff

At the new transient flame; no babbling crowd
Of coxcombry in admiration loud,

Or with adulterous whisper to destroy
Her duty, and her glory, and her joy;
With faith and feelings naked as her form,
She stood as stands a rainbow in the storm,

Changing its hues with bright variety,
But still expanding lovelier o'er the sky,
Howe'er its arch may swell, its colours move,
The cloud-compelling harbinger of Love.

Here, in this grotto of the wave-worn shore They passed the Tropic's red meridian o'er; Nor long the hours they never paused o'er time, Unbroken by the clock's funereal chime, Which deals the daily pittance of our span, And points and mocks with iron laugh at man. What deem'd they of the future or the past? The present, like a tyrant, held them fast: Their hour-glass was the sea sand, and the tide, Like her smooth billow, saw their moments glide; Their clock the sun, in his unbounded tower; They reckon'd not, whose day was but an hour; The nightingale, their only vesper bell, Sung sweetly to the rose the day's farewell; The broad sun set, but not with lingering sweep, As in the North he mellows o'er the deep, But fiery, full, and fierce, as if he left The world for ever, earth of light bereft, Plunged with red forehead down along the wave, As dives a hero headlong to his grave.

Then rose they, looking first along the skies, And then for light into each other's eyes, Wondering that summer showed so brief a sun, And asking if indeed the day were done?

And let not this seem strange; the devotee
Lives not in earth, but in his ecstacy;
Around him days and worlds are heedless driven,
His soul is gone before his dust to heaven.

Is love less potent? No-his path is trod,
Alike uplifted gloriously to God;

I