The crimson tints the sea-bird’s wing
At every downward sweep;
Yet even they in mid air spring,
As if they shunned the deep.
How white and wan their wings appear
Amid the dusky air!
One pale, as if with conscious fear—
One dark, as with despair.
On struggles still the gallant ship,
But every time more weak:
Amid the waves her rent sails dip,
The billows o’er her break.
No human hands are on her deck,
No cry is on the air,
The waves have swept above the wreck—
Death is the monarch there.
Darker and darker grows the sky,
And darker grows the sea,
And darker grows the human eye,
That such a sight must see.
There rises an appealing cry,
But only from the shore.
One last black wave has burst on high—
That ship is seen no more.
For many days to come were flung
Strange relics on the strand,
Wealth over which wild whispers hung,
And foreign gun and brand.
And of a dark and mingled race
The bodies washed ashore;
Hardships were marked on every face
And wild the garb they wore.
Day after day the waves restore
To land th’ unburied dead;
And old men, as they came ashore,
Watched each dark face, and said,
That God was good—and still his power
Avenged the course of ill;
That winds and waters knew the hour
In which to work his will.
62
