Chapter 18
Now like the soul of Ophir on the sea Glittered the _Golden Hynde_, and all her heart Turned home to England. As a child that finds A ruby ring upon the highway, straight Homeward desires to run with it, so she Yearned for her home and country. Yet the world Was all in arms behind her. Fleet on fleet Awaited her return. Along the coast The very churches melted down their chimes And cast them into cannon. To the South A thousand cannon watched Magellan's straits, And fleets were scouring all the sea like hounds, With orders that where'er they came on Drake, Although he were the Dragon of their dreams, They should out-blast his thunders and convey, Dead or alive, his body back to Spain.
And Drake laughed out and said, "My trusty lads Of Devon, you have made the wide world ring With England's name; you have swept one half the seas From sky to sky; and in our oaken hold You have packed the gorgeous Indies. We shall sail But slowly with such wealth. If we return, We are one against ten thousand! We will seek The fabled Northern passage, take our gold Safe home; then out to sea again and try Our guns against their guns."
* * * *
And as they sailed Northward, they swooped on warm blue Guatulco For food and water. Nigh the dreaming port The grand alcaldes in high conclave sat, Blazing with gold and scarlet, as they tried A batch of negro slaves upon the charge Of idleness in Spanish mines; dumb slaves, With bare scarred backs and labour-broken knees, And sorrowful eyes like those of wearied kine Spent from the ploughing. Even as the judge Rose to condemn them to the knotted lash The British boat's crew, quiet and compact, Entered the court. The grim judicial glare Grew wider with amazement, and the judge Staggered against his gilded throne. "I thank Almighty God," cried Drake, "who hath given me this --That I who once, in ignorance, procured Slaves for the golden bawdy-house of Spain, May now, in England's name, help to requite That wrong. For now I say in England's name, Where'er her standard flies, the slave shall stand Upright, the shackles fall from off his limbs. Unyoke the prisoners: tell them they are men Once more, not beasts of burden. Set them free; But take these gold and scarlet popinjays Aboard my _Golden Hynde_; and let them write An order that their town shall now provide My boats with food and water." This being done, The slaves being placed in safety on the prize, The _Golden Hynde_ revictualled and the casks Replenished with fresh water, Drake set free The judges and swept Northward once again; And, off the coast of Nicaragua, found A sudden treasure better than all gold; For on the track of the China trade they caught A ship whereon two China pilots sailed, And in their cabin lay the secret charts, Red hieroglyphs of Empire, unknown charts Of silken sea-roads down the golden West Where all roads meet and East and West are one. And, with that mystery stirring in their hearts Like a strange cry from home, Northward they swept And Northward, till the soft luxurious coasts Hardened, the winds grew bleak, the great green waves Loomed high like mountains round them, and the spray Froze on their spars and yards. Fresh from the warmth Of tropic seas the men could hardly brook That cold; and when the floating hills of ice Like huge green shadows crowned with ghostly snow Went past them with strange whispers in the gloom, Or took mysterious colours in the dawn, Their hearts misgave them, and they found no way; But all was iron shore and icy sea. And one by one the crew fell sick to death In that fierce winter, and the land still ran Westward and showed no passage. Tossed with storms, Onward they plunged, or furrowed gentler tides Of ice-lit emerald that made the prow A faery beak of some enchanted ship Flinging wild rainbows round her as she drove Thro' seas unsailed by mortal mariners, Past isles unhailed of any human voice, Where sound and silence mingled in one song Of utter solitude. Ever as they went The flag of England blazoned the broad breeze, Northward, where never ship had sailed before, Northward, till lost in helpless wonderment, Dazed as a soul awakening from the dream Of death to some wild dawn in Paradise (Yet burnt with cold as they whose very tears Freeze on their faces where Cocytus wails) All world-worn, bruised, wing-broken, wracked, and wrenched, Blackened with lightning, scarred as with evil deeds, But all embalmed in beauty by that sun Which never sets, bosomed in peace at last The _Golden Hynde_ rocked on a glittering calm. Seas that no ship had ever sailed, from sky To glistening sky, swept round them. Glory and gleam, Glamour and lucid rapture and diamond air Embraced her broken spars, begrimed with gold Her gloomy hull, rocking upon a sphere New made, it seemed, mysterious with the first Mystery of the world, where holy sky And sacred sea shone like the primal Light Of God, a-stir with whispering sea-bird's wings And glorious with clouds. Only, all day, All night, the rhythmic utterance of His will In the deep sigh of seas that washed His throne, Rose and relapsed across Eternity, Timed to the pulse of æons. All their world Seemed strange as unto us the great new heavens And glittering shores, if on some aery bark To Saturn's coasts we came and traced no more The tiny gleam of our familiar earth Far off, but heard tremendous oceans roll Round unimagined continents, and saw Terrible mountains unto which our Alps Were less than mole-hills, and such gaunt ravines Cleaving them and such cataracts roaring down As burst the gates of our earth-moulded senses, Pour the eternal glory on our souls, And, while ten thousand chariots bring the dawn, Hurl us poor midgets trembling to our knees. Glory and glamour and rapture of lucid air, Ice cold, with subtle colours of the sky Embraced her broken spars, belted her hulk With brilliance, while she dipped her jacinth beak In waves of mounded splendour, and sometimes A great ice-mountain flashed and floated by Throned on the waters, pinnacled and crowned With all the smouldering jewels in the world; Or in the darkness, glimmering berg on berg, All emerald to the moon, went by like ghosts Whispering to the South. There, as they lay, Waiting a wind to fill the stiffened sails, Their hearts remembered that in England now The Spring was nigh, and in that lonely sea The skilled musicians filled their eyes with home.
SONG
I
_It is the Spring-tide now! Under the hawthorn-bough The milkmaid goes: Her eyes are violets blue Washed with the morning dew, Her mouth a rose. It is the Spring-tide now._
II
_The lanes are growing sweet, The lambkins frisk and bleat In all the meadows: The glossy dappled kine Blink in the warm sunshine, Cooling their shadows. It is the Spring-tide now._
III
_Soon hand in sunburnt hand Thro' God's green fairyland, England, our home, Whispering as they stray Adown the primrose way, Lovers will roam. It is the Spring-tide now._
And then, with many a chain of linkèd sweetness, Harmonious gold, they drew their hearts and souls Back, back to England, thoughts of wife and child, Mother and sweetheart and the old companions, The twisted streets of London and the deep Delight of Devon lanes, all softly voiced In words or cadences, made them breathe hard And gaze across the everlasting sea, Craving for that small isle so far away.
SONG
I
_O, you beautiful land, Deep-bosomed with beeches and bright With the flowery largesse of May Sweet from the palm of her hand Out-flung, till the hedges grew white As the green-arched billows with spray._
II
White from the fall of her feet The daisies awake in the sun! Cliff-side and valley and plain With the breath of the thyme growing sweet Laugh, for the Spring is begun; And Love hath turned homeward again.
_O, you beautiful land!_
III
Where should the home be of Love, But there, where the hawthorn-tree blows, And the milkmaid trips out with her pail, And the skylark in heaven above Sings, till the West is a rose And the East is a nightingale?
_O, you beautiful land!_
IV
There where the sycamore trees Are shading the satin-skinned kine, And oaks, whose brethren of old Conquered the strength of the seas, Grow broad in the sunlight and shine Crowned with their cressets of gold;
_O, you beautiful land!_
V
Deep-bosomed with beeches and bright With rose-coloured cloudlets above; Billowing broad and grand Where the meadows with blossom are white For the foot-fall, the foot-fall of Love. O, you beautiful land!
VI
How should we sing of thy beauty, England, mother of men, We that can look in thine eyes And see there the splendour of duty Deep as the depth of their ken, Wide as the ring of thy skies.
VII
_O, you beautiful land, Deep-bosomed with beeches and bright With the flowery largesse of May Sweet from the palm of her hand Out-flung, till the hedges grew white As the green-arched billows with spray, O, you beautiful land!_
And when a fair wind rose again, there seemed No hope of passage by that fabled way Northward, and suddenly Drake put down his helm And, with some wondrous purpose in his eyes, Turned Southward once again, until he found A lonely natural harbour on the coast Near San Francisco, where the cliffs were white Like those of England, and the soft soil teemed With gold. There they careened the _Golden Hynde_-- Her keel being thick with barnacles and weeds-- And built a fort and dockyard to refit Their little wandering home, not half so large As many a coasting barque to-day that scarce Would cross the Channel, yet she had swept the seas Of half the world, and even now prepared For new adventures greater than them all. And as the sound of chisel and hammer broke The stillness of that shore, shy figures came, Keen-faced and grave-eyed Indians, from the woods To bow before the strange white-faced newcomers As gods. Whereat the chaplain all aghast Persuaded them with signs and broken words And grunts that even Drake was but a man, Whom none the less the savages would crown With woven flowers and barbarous ritual King of New Albion--so the seamen called That land, remembering the white cliffs of home. Much they implored, with many a sign and cry, Which by the rescued slaves upon the prize Were part interpreted, that Drake would stay And rule them; and the vision of the great Empire of Englishmen arose and flashed A moment round them, on that lonely shore. A small and weather-beaten band they stood, Bronzed seamen by the laughing rescued slaves, Ringed with gigantic loneliness and saw An Empire that should liberate the world; A Power before the lightning of whose arms Darkness should die and all oppression cease; A Federation of the strong and weak, Whereby the weak were strengthened and the strong Made stronger in the increasing good of all; A gathering up of one another's loads; A turning of the wasteful rage of war To accomplish large and fruitful tasks of peace, Even as the strength of some great stream is turned To grind the corn for bread. E'en thus on England That splendour dawned which those in dreams foresaw And saw not with their living eyes, but thou, England, mayst lift up eyes at last and see, Who, like that angel of the Apocalypse Hast set one foot upon thy sea-girt isle, The other upon the waters, and canst raise Now, if thou wilt, above the assembled nations, The trumpet of deliverance to thy lips.
* * * *
At last their task was done, the _Golden Hynde_ Undocked, her white wings hoisted; and away Westward they swiftly glided from the shore Where, with a wild lament, their Indian friends, Knee-deep i' the creaming foam, all stood at gaze, Like men that for one moment in their lives Have seen a mighty drama cross their path And played upon the stage of vast events Knowing, henceforward, all their life is nought. But Westward sped the little _Golden Hynde_ Across the uncharted ocean, with no guide But that great homing cry of all their hearts. Far out of sight of land they steered, straight out Across the great Pacific, in those days When even the compass proved no trusty guide, Straight out they struck in that small bark, straight out Week after week, without one glimpse of aught But heaving seas, across the uncharted waste Straight to the sunset. Laughingly they sailed, With all that gorgeous booty in their holds, A splendour dragging deep through seas of doom, A prey to the first great hurricane that blew Except their God averted it. And still Their skilled musicians cheered the way along To shores beyond the sunset and the sea. And oft at nights, the yellow fo'c'sle lanthorn Swung over swarthy singing faces grouped Within the four small wooden walls that made Their home and shut them from the unfathomable Depths of mysterious gloom without that rolled All around them; or Tom Moone would heartily troll A simple stave that struggled oft with thoughts Beyond its reach, yet reached their hearts no less.
SONG
I
_Good luck befall you, mariners all That sail this world so wide! Whither we go, not yet we know: We steer by wind and tide, Be it right or wrong, I sing this song; For now it seems to me Men steer their souls thro' rocks and shoals As mariners use by sea._
Chorus: _As mariners use by sea, My lads, As mariners use by sea!_
II
_And now they plough to windward, now They drive before the gale! Now are they hurled across the world With torn and tattered sail; Yet, as they will, they steer and still Defy the world's rude glee: Till death o'erwhelm them, mast and helm, They ride and rule the sea._
Chorus: _They ride and rule the sea, My lads, They ride and rule the sea!_
* * * *
Meantime, in England, Bess of Sydenham, Drake's love and queen, being told that Drake was dead, And numbed with grief, obeying her father's will That dreadful summer morn in bridal robes Had passed to wed her father's choice. The sun Streamed smiling on her as she went, half-dazed, Amidst her smiling maids. Nigh to the sea The church was, and the mellow marriage bells Mixed with its music. Far away, white sails Spangled the sapphire, white as flying blossoms New-fallen from her crown; but as the glad And sad procession neared the little church, From some strange ship-of-war, far out at sea, There came a sudden tiny puff of smoke-- And then a dull strange throb, a whistling hiss, And scarce a score of yards away a shot Ploughed up the turf. None knew, none ever knew From whence it came, whether a perilous jest Of English seamen, or a wanton deed Of Spaniards, or mere accident; but all Her maids in flight were scattered. Bess awoke As from a dream, crying aloud--"'Tis he, 'Tis he that sends this message. He is not dead. I will not pass the porch. Come home with me. 'Twas he that sent that message." Nought availed, Her father's wrath, her mother's tears, her maids' Cunning persuasions, nought; home she returned, And waited for the dead to come to life; Nor waited long; for ere that month was out, Rumour on rumour reached the coasts of England, Borne as it seemed on sea-birds' wings, that Drake Was on his homeward way.