Cape Cod Ballads, and Other Verse | Page 2

battered schooner rocks and heaves.
_To same the gain, to some the loss,
To each the chance, the risk, the
fight:
For men must die that men may live--
Lord, may we steer our
course aright._.
The dripping deck beneath him reels,
The flooded scuppers spout the
brine;
He heeds them not, he only feels
The tugging of a tightened
line.
The grim white sea-fog o'er him throws
Its clammy curtain, damp and
cold;
He minds it not--his work he knows,
'T is but to fill an empty

hold.
Oft, driven through the night's blind wrack,
He feels the dread berg's
ghastly breath,
Or hears draw nigh through walls of black
A
throbbing engine chanting death;
But with a calm, unwrinkled brow

He fronts them, grim and undismayed,
For storm and ice and liner's
bow--
These are but chances of the trade.
Yet well he knows--where'er it be,
On low Cape Cod or bluff Cape
Ann--
With straining eyes that search the sea
A watching woman
waits her man:
He knows it, and his love is deep,
But work is work,
and bread is bread,
And though men drown and women weep
The
hungry thousands must be fed.
To some the gain, to some the loss,
To each his chance, the game with
Fate:
For men must die that men may live--
Dear Lord, be kind to
those who wait.

THE SONG OF THE SEA
Oh, the song of the Sea--
The wonderful song of the Sea!
Like the
far-off hum of a throbbing drum
It steals through the night to me:

And my fancy wanders free
To a little seaport town,
And a spot I
knew, where the roses grew
By a cottage small and brown;
And a
child strayed up and down
O'er hillock and beach and lea,
And
crept at dark to his bed, to hark
To the wonderful song of the Sea.
Oh, the song of the Sea--
The mystical song of the Sea!
What
strains of joy to a dreaming boy
That music was wont to be!
And
the night-wind through the tree
Was a perfumed breath that told
Of
the spicy gales that filled the sails
Where the tropic billows rolled

And the rovers hid their gold

By the lone palm on the key,--
But the
whispering wave their secret gave
In the mystical song of the Sea.

Oh, the song of the Sea--
The beautiful song of the Sea!
The mighty
note from the ocean's throat,
The laugh of the wind in glee!
And
swift as the ripples flee
With the surges down the shore,
It bears me
back, o'er life's long track,
To home and its love once more.
I stand
at the open door,
Dear mother, again with thee,
And hear afar on
the booming bar
The beautiful song of the Sea.

THE WIND'S SONG
Oh, the wild November wind,
How it blew!
How the dead leaves
rasped and rustled,
Soared and sank and buzzed and bustled
As they flew;
While above the empty square,
Seeming skeletons in
air,
Battered branches, brown and bare,
Gauntly grinned;
And the frightened dust-clouds, flying.
Heard the
calling and the crying
Of the wind,--
The wild November wind.
Oh, the wild November wind,
How it screamed!
How it moaned
and mocked and muttered
At the cottage window, shuttered,
Whence there streamed
Fitful flecks of firelight mild:
And within, a
mother smiled,
Singing softly to her child
As there dinned
Round the gabled roof and rafter
Long and loud the
shout and laughter
Of the wind,--
The wild November wind.
Oh, the wild November wind,
How it rang
Through the rigging of a
vessel
Rocking where the great waves wrestle!

And it sang,
Light and low, that mother's song;
And the master,
staunch and strong,
Heard the sweet strain drift along--
Softened, thinned,--
Heard the tightened cordage ringing
Till it
seemed a loved voice singing
In the wind,--
The wild November wind.

THE LIFE-SAVER
(Dedicated to the Men in the United States Life-saving Service.)
When the Lord breathes his wrath above the bosom of the waters,
When the rollers are a-poundin' on the shore,
When the mariner's
a-thinkin' of his wife and sons and daughters, And the little home he'll,
maybe, see no more;
When the bars are white and yeasty and the
shoals are all a-frothin', When the wild no'theaster's cuttin' like a knife;

Through the seethin' roar and screech he's patrollin' on the beach,--
The Gov'ment's hired man fer savin' life.
He's strugglin' with the gusts that strike and bruise him like a hammer,
He's fightin' sand that stings like swarmin' bees,
He's list'nin' through
the whirlwind and the thunder and the clamor-- A-list'nin' fer the signal
from the seas;
He's breakin' ribs and muscles launchin' life-boats in
the surges, He's drippin' wet and chilled in every bone,
He's bringin'
men from death back ter flesh and blood and breath, And he never
stops ter think about his own;
He's a-pullin' at an oar that is freezin' to his fingers,
He's a-clingin' in
the riggin' of a wreck,
He knows destruction's nearer every minute
that he lingers, But it do'n't appear ter worry him a speck:
He's
draggin' draggled corpses from the clutches of the combers-- The kind
of job a common chap would shirk--
But he takes 'em from the wave
and he fits 'em fer the grave, And