7
"Oh! who would think her portion bless'd
A wandering seaman's wife to be,
To hug the infant to her breast,
Whose father's on a stormy sea!"
The thunder bursts! the lightning falls:
The casement rattles with the rain,
And, as the gusty tempest bawls,
The little cottage quakes again!—
She doesn't speak; she doesn't sigh!
She gazes on her infant dear—
A smile lights up the cherub's eye,
Which dims its mother's with a tear!
"Oh! who would be a seaman's wife!
Oh! who would bear a seaman's child:
To tremble for her husband's life,
To weep-because her infant smild."
Ne'er hadst thou born a seaman's boy—
Ne'er had thy husband left the shore—
Thou ne'er hadst felt the frantic joy,
To see—thy Robin at the door!
To press his weather-beaten cheek,
To kiss it dry and warm again,
To weep the joy thou couldst not speak—
So pleasure's in the debt of pain!
Thy cheerful fire, thy plain repast,
Thy little couch of love I ween,
