I not wonder much That he who sails the ocean should be sad.
I am myself reflective.

When I think Of all this wallowing beast, the Sea, has sucked Between his sharp, thin lips, the wedgy waves, What heaps of diamonds, rubies, emeralds, pearls; What piles of shekels, talents, ducats, crowns, What bales of Tyrian mantles, Indian shawls, Of laces that have blanked the weavers' eyes, Of silken tissues, wrought by worm and man, The half-starved workman, and the well-fed worm; What marbles, bronzes, pictures, parchments, books; What many-lobuled, thought-engendering brains; Lie with the gaping sea-shells in his maw,-- I, too, am silent; for all language seems A mockery, and the speech of man is vain.
O mariner, we look upon the waves And they rebuke our babbling.

"Peace!" they say,-- "Mortal, be still!" My noisy tongue is hushed, And with my trembling finger on my lips My soul exclaims in ecstasy-- MAN AT WHEEL.
Belay! CABIN PASSENGER.
Ah yes! "Delay,"-- it calls, "nor haste to break The charm of stillness with an idle word!" O mariner, I love thee, for thy thought Strides even with my own, nay, flies before.
Thou art a brother to the wind and wave; Have they not music for thine ear as mine, When the wild tempest makes thy ship his lyre, Smiting a cavernous basso from the shrouds And climbing up his gamut through the stays, Through buntlines, bowlines, ratlines, till it shrills An alto keener than the locust sings, And all the great Aeolian orchestra Storms out its mad sonata in the gale?
Is not the scene a wondrous and-- MAN AT WHEEL.
A vast! CABIN PASSENGER.
Ah yes, a vast, a vast and wondrous scene! I see thy soul is open as the day That holds the sunshine in its azure bowl To all the solemn glories of the deep.
Tell me, O mariner, dost thou never feel The grandeur of thine office,--to control The keel that cuts the ocean like a knife And leaves a wake behind it like a seam In the great shining garment of the world?
MAN AT WHEEL.
Belay y'r jaw, y' swab! y' hoss-marine! (To the Captain.) Ay, ay, Sir! Stiddy, Sir! Sou'wes' b' sou'! November 10, 1864.
CHANSON WITHOUT MUSIC BY THE PROFESSOR EMERITUS OF DEAD AND LIVE LANGUAGES PHI BETA KAPPA .-- CAMBRIDGE, 1867 You bid me sing,--can I forget The classic ode of days gone by,-- How belle Fifine and jeune Lisette Exclaimed, "Anacreon, geron ei"?
"Regardez done," those ladies said,-- "You're getting bald and wrinkled too When summer's roses all are shed, Love 's nullum ite, voyez-vous!" In vain ce brave Anacreon's cry, "Of Love alone my banjo sings" (Erota mounon).

"Etiam si,-- Eh b'en ?" replied the saucy things,-- "Go find a maid whose hair is gray, And strike your lyre,--we sha'n't complain; But parce nobis, s'il vous plait,-- Voila Adolphe! Voila Eugene!" Ah, jeune Lisette! Ah, belle Fifine! Anacreon's lesson all must learn; O kairos oxiis; Spring is green, But Acer Hyems waits his turn I hear you whispering from the dust, "Tiens, mon cher, c'est toujours so,-- The brightest blade grows dim with rust, The fairest meadow white with snow!" You do not mean it! _Not_ encore?
Another string of playday rhymes?
You 've heard me--nonne est ?-before, Multoties,-more than twenty times; Non possum,--vraiment,--pas du tout, I cannot! I am loath to shirk; But who will listen if I do, My memory makes such shocking work?
Ginosko.Scio.Yes, I 'm told Some ancients like my rusty lay, As Grandpa Noah loved the old Red-sandstone march of Jubal's day.
I used to carol like the birds, But time my wits has quite unfixed, Et quoad verba,--for my words,-- Ciel! Eheu! Whe-ew!--how they're mixed! Mehercle! Zeu! Diable! how My thoughts were dressed when I was young, But tempus fugit! see them now Half clad in rags of every tongue! O philoi, fratres, chers amis I dare not court the youthful Muse, For fear her sharp response should be, "Papa Anacreon, please excuse!" Adieu! I 've trod my annual track How long!--let others count the miles,-- And peddled out my rhyming pack To friends who always paid in smiles.
So, laissez-moi! some youthful wit No doubt has wares he wants to show; And I am asking, "Let me sit," Dum ille clamat, "Dos pou sto!" FOR THE CENTENNIAL DINNER OF THE PROPRIETORS OF BOSTON PIER, OR THE LONG WHARF, APRIL 16, 1873 DEAR friends, we are strangers; we never before Have suspected what love to each other we bore; But each of us all to his neighbor is dear, Whose heart has a throb for our time-honored pier.
As I look on each brother proprietor's face, I could open my arms in a loving embrace; What wonder that feelings, undreamed of so long, Should burst all at once in a blossom of song! While I turn my fond glance on the monarch of piers, Whose throne has stood firm through his eightscore of years, My thought travels backward and reaches the day When they drove the first pile on the edge of the bay.
See! The joiner, the shipwright, the smith from his forge, The redcoat, who shoulders his gun for King George, The shopman, the 'prentice, the boys from the lane, The parson, the doctor with gold-headed cane, Come trooping down King Street, where now may be seen The pulleys and ropes of a mighty machine; The weight rises slowly; it drops with a thud; And, to! the great timber sinks deep in the mud! They are gone, the stout craftsmen that hammered the piles, And the square-toed old boys in the three-cornered tiles; The breeches, the buckles, have faded from view, And the parson's white wig and the ribbon-tied queue.
The redcoats have vanished; the last grenadier Stepped into the boat from the end of our pier; They found that our hills were not easy to climb, And the order came, "Countermarch, double-quick time!" They are gone, friend and foe,--anchored fast at the pier, Whence no vessel brings back its pale passengers here; But our wharf, like a lily, still floats on the flood, Its breast in the sunshine, its roots in the mud.
Who--who that has loved it so long and so well-- The flower of his birthright would barter or sell?
No: pride of the bay, while its ripples shall run, You shall pass, as an heirloom, from father to son! Let me part with the acres my grandfather bought, With the bonds that my uncle's kind legacy brought, With my bank-shares,--old "Union," whose ten per cent stock Stands stiff through the storms as the Eddystone rock; With my rights (or my wrongs) in the "Erie,"-- alas! With my claims on the mournful and "Mutual Mass.;" With my "Phil.

Wil.