THE SAILOR'S APPEAL.
Ye dwellers on the stable land,
Of danger what know ye,
Like us who brave the whelming surge,
Or trust the treacherous sea?
The fair trees shade you from the sun,
You see the harvests grow,
And breathe the fragrance of the breeze
When the first roses blow.
You slumber on your beds of down,
Close wrapp'd, in chambers warm,
Lull'd only to a deeper dream
By the descending storm;
While high amid the slippery shroud
We make our midnight path,
And e'en the strongest mast is bow'd
Beneath the tempest's wrath.
Yet still, what know ye of the joy
That lights our ocean-strife,
When on its way our gallant ship
Rides like a thing of life;
When gayly towards the wish'd-for port
With favouring wind we stand,
Or first your misty line descry,
Hills of our native land!