THE THREE CAPTAINS
57
Her rigging was rough with the clotted drift that drives in a Northern breeze,
Her sides were clogged with the lazy weed that spawns in the Eastern seas.
Light she rode in the rude tide-rip, to left and right she rolled,
And the skipper sat on the scuttle-butt and stared at an empty hold.
‘I ha’ paid Port dues for your Law,’ quoth he, ‘and where is the Law ye boast
‘If I sail unscathed from a heathen port to be robbed on a Christian coast?
‘Ye have smoked the hives of the Laccadives as we burn the lice in a bunk,
‘We tack not now to a Gallang prow or a plunging Pei-ho junk;
‘I had no fear but the seas were clear as far as a sail might fare
‘Till I met with a lime-washed Yankee brig that rode off Finisterre.
‘There were canvas blinds to his bow-gun ports to screen the weight he bore
‘And the signals ran for a merchantman from Sandy Hook to the Nore.
Her sides were clogged with the lazy weed that spawns in the Eastern seas.
Light she rode in the rude tide-rip, to left and right she rolled,
And the skipper sat on the scuttle-butt and stared at an empty hold.
‘I ha’ paid Port dues for your Law,’ quoth he, ‘and where is the Law ye boast
‘If I sail unscathed from a heathen port to be robbed on a Christian coast?
‘Ye have smoked the hives of the Laccadives as we burn the lice in a bunk,
‘We tack not now to a Gallang prow or a plunging Pei-ho junk;
‘I had no fear but the seas were clear as far as a sail might fare
‘Till I met with a lime-washed Yankee brig that rode off Finisterre.
‘There were canvas blinds to his bow-gun ports to screen the weight he bore
‘And the signals ran for a merchantman from Sandy Hook to the Nore.
