There is a silence in that ship;
Each step is softly taken,
As around some dear one's bed
Whose sleep they feared to waken.
But it is not sleep, now rocked
By the heaving of the billow,
But a darker slumber flits
Around a weary pillow.
They have brought her from the land
Where her parents' ashes slumber;
They have brought her to the south,
But her days have told their number.
Though the vault that bears her name
Will not open for another,
And she is the only child
That sleeps not by her mother;
Yet the loveliest and the last
Of that ancient line is failing,
Like those evanescent hues
In the shadowy west now paling.
She is laid upon the deck,
For the cool land-breeze is blowing;
But the last faint warmth of life
Fast from her cheek is going.
