The Arctic Queen | Page 8

man; and in his hand
A spear that dripped with her pursuer's
blood.
With still unconquered terror of the brute
She turned her
head.
"Fear nothing, thou sweet child;
But if thou art what now thou dost
appear,
A creature of that world from whence I come,
Let me but
hear thy voice--but hear one word
Of my blest country's language,
and I'll deem
The service I have done thee with this spear
Naught in
comparison. Speak, quickly speak!"
"What shall I say, but thank thee for my life?
I am a maiden from far
Southern climes
Come searching for my lover. Dost thou know

Where cruel OENE hast my BERTHO hidden?

What do'est thou here?

It must be thou art come
In search of wife or child,--what other fate

Could lead thee to such barren heights as these?"
"Alas! dear child! there are other springs than love
To move the
human heart. Ambition, may be;
Or better, a desire to serve my
Queen
And my illustrious country, led me here."
He paused and sighed. She saw his locks were thin;
Some white with
years, but more with troubled toil;
And that he stood barefooted in the
snow.
The pitying tears began within her eyes
To gather into
brightness as she gazed,
Upon the grey, sublime, forlorn old man.

Coldly the moonlight glinted o'er the group
Regarding each the other
with surprise:--
She, sad at his abandonment of hope;
He, struck
with mingled wonder and delight
To meet this woman, beautiful and
young.
"Dear friend," she said, brushing away her tears,
"If thou wilt rest
thee on this smoothest rock
And tell me who thou art, and whence did
come,
And wherefore lingering here, pleased will I listen."
A smile stole o'er his pale, storm-beaten face.--
"I know thee now,
from mother Eve descended,
By thy most feminine willingness to
hear,
The sorrows which did claim thy ready tears
While they were
but suspected. Sit thee down.
Five years it is since, with three stately
ships
And sturdy crews to man them, one proud day
I sailed away
from the great three-linked isle,
Under my fair Queen's sovereign
patronage,
For the far Frigid Zone--the wild, the fierce,
The
unknown Arctic seas--through their cold depths,
Their intricate,
unmarked, majestic ways,
To find a North-West Passage: which wise
men
And skillful mariners, learned of the sea,
Suspected, through
the navigator's art
Might to the world be opened. High my heart

With courage and ambition swelled its tides,
Knowledge I had and
skill, with enterprise;
And should I be successful, future times

Should know my name, and future mariners

Respect my fame and

emulate my deeds.
But one faint spot was there in my proud heart,

And that was where my constant wife, at parting,
Shed sorrowful
tears, until they did strike through,
A fear, into my breast, that
nevermore
That faithful brow should lean to it again.
"To thee, if thou indeed hast safely passed
The horrors and the
beauties of the sea,
I need not tell the ever-varying scenes
Of this
most fearful voyage.
"Day by day
I studied in my cabin over charts;
Or, on the deck,
learned of the sea and sky
The subtle mariner's ever-changeful lore.

Prosperous we were, till o'er the mystic bounds
Of OENE's realms I
sailed; save now and then
Some noble sailor of my kindly crews

With tears we left upon the bloomless shores
Where birds nor flowers
should ever bless his grave.
On--on--beyond all shores--or sights of
dwarfs
Slaying the rein-deer by their snow-built huts:--
On, through
the thickening perils of the way!
Methought I held within my brain
the clue
Through that bewildering labyrinth of ice.
For weeks the
Sun, a pale and sinking ghost,
With feeble eyes had glared upon the
Pole.
Nor with his wavering arrows could o'erthrow
Even the airy
domes of delicate sprites,
Sitting and decking their etherial robes

And turning them, sparkling, to his sullen face.
"Now from OENE's dominions, messengers,
Borne by the flying
winds, hourly arrived,
Warning me from her shores. At last the Queen,

Gathered together her enormous fleet;
It bore down upon us with
such grand array
As I pray heaven never to see again.
An hundred
giant ships, whose rainbow sails
And glittering masts towered a
thousand feet
Above our tiny vessels, weighed their anchors
And
slowly from their harbors drifted out.
We heard the creaking of their
cables--heard
The shouting of their fierce and naked crews--
We
saw the green sea boil against their keels--
Their viewless banners
flapped against our faces--
Their viewless darts pierced us on every
side
Till men fell on our decks, a stony heap.
We strove, at least, to

make a brave retreat,
Toiling in mute dispair, or madly praying
The
winds to favor our poor, shattered sails.
They closed around us upon
every side.
Two of the largest of their avenging fleet,
Drawing
together crushed in the embrace
My stoutest vessel like some frailest
shell;
Then swung apart, with laughter on their decks,
Showing me,
where my noble friends had been,
Only a seething gulf. The sweat of
anguish
Froze into hail upon my pallid brow,
When, with another
shriek of agony,
The brother ship went down. At length the winds,

Saving us only from more sudden death,
Drove us upon the rocks
beneath this mount.
Five years had wasted all our store of food;
But,
seeing monsters like this beast of prey,
Some of the least exhausted
boldly