NSHO

Loud sang the souls of the jolly, jolly mariners,
Plucking at their harps, and they plucked

unhandily:

"Our thumbs are rough and tarred,

And the tune is something hard

May we lift a Deep-sea Chantey such as seamen use at sea?"

Then said the souls of the gentlemen-adventurersFettered wrist to bar all for red iniquity:

"Ho, we revel in our chains

O'er the sorrow that was Spain's;

Heave or sink it, leave or drink it, we were masters

of the sea!"

Up spake the soul of a gray Gothavn 'speckshioner— (He that led the flinching in the fleets of fair Dundee):

"Oh, the ice-blink white and near,

And the bowhead breaching clear!

Will Ye whelm them all for wantonness that wallow

in the sea?"

Loud sang the souls of the jolly, jolly mariners, Crying: "Under Heaven, here is neither lead nor lee!

Must we sing for evermore

On the windless, glassy floor?

Take back your golden fiddles and we'll beat to

open sea!"

Then stooped the Lord, and He called the good sea up to Him,

And 'stablished his borders unto all eternity,
That such as have no pleasure

For to praise the Lord by measure,

They may enter into galleons and serve Him on the sea.

Sun, wind, and cloud shall fail not from the face of it, Stinging, ringing spindrift, nor the fulmar flying

free;

And the ships shall go abroad

To the Glory of the Lord

Who heard the silly sailor-folk and gave them back their sea!

THE MERCHANTMEN

KING SOLOMON drew merchantmen,
Because of his desire

For peacocks, apes, and ivory,
From Tarshish unto Tyre:
With cedars out of Lebanon

Which Hiram rafted down,

But we be only sailormen

That use in London Town.

Coastwise -cross-seas—round the world and back again—

Where the flaw shall head us or the full Trade suits

Plain-sail-storm-sail-lay your board and tack again

And that's the way we'll pay Paddy Doyle for his boots!

We bring no store of ingots,

Of spice or precious stones,
But that we have we gathered
With sweat and aching bones: