Part 2

You’ll mainsail-haul my bits o’ things when Christ has took my soul, ’N’ you’ll lay me quiet somewhere at the landward end the Mole, Where I shall hear the steamers’ sterns a-squattering from the heave, And the topsail blocks a-piping when a rope-yarn fouls the sheave.

Give me a sup of lime-juice; Lord, I’m drifting in to port, The landfall lies to windward and the wind comes light and short, And I’m for signing off and out to take my watch below, And--prop a fellow, Jakey--Lord, it’s time for me to go!

THE TURN OF THE TIDE

An’ Bill can have my sea-boots, Nigger Jim can have my knife, You can divvy up the dungarees an’ bed, An’ the ship can have my blessing, an’ the Lord can have my life, An’ sails an’ fish my body when I’m dead.

An’ dreaming down below there in the tangled greens an’ blues, Where the sunlight shudders golden round about, I shall hear the ships complainin’ an’ the cursin’ of the crews, An’ be sorry when the watch is tumbled out.

I shall hear them hilly-hollying the weather crojick brace, And the sucking of the wash about the hull; When they chanty up the topsail I’ll be hauling in my place, For my soul will follow seawards like a gull.

I shall hear the blocks a-grunting in the bumpkins over-side, An’ the slatting of the storm-sails on the stay, An’ the rippling of the catspaw at the making of the tide, An’ the swirl and splash of porpoises at play.

An’ Bill can have my sea-boots, Nigger Jim can have my knife, You can divvy up the whack I haven’t scofft, An’ the ship can have my blessing and the Lord can have my life, For it’s time I quit the deck and went aloft.

ONE OF WALLY’S YARNS

The watch was up on the topsail-yard a-making fast the sail, ’N’ Joe was swiggin’ his gasket taut, ’n’ I felt the stirrup _give_, ’N’ he dropped sheer from the tops’l-yard ’n’ barely cleared the rail, ’N’ o’ course, we bein’ aloft, _we_ couldn’t do nothin’-- We couldn’t lower a boat and go a-lookin’ for him, For it blew hard ’n’ there was sech a sea runnin’ That no boat wouldn’t live.

I seed him rise in the white o’ the wake, I seed him lift a hand (’N’ him in his oilskin suit ’n’ all), I heard him lift a cry; ’N’ there was his place on the yard ’n’ all, ’n’ the stirrup’s busted strand. ’N’ the old man said there’s a cruel old sea runnin’, A cold green Barney’s Bull of a sea runnin’; It’s hard, but I ain’t agoin’ to let a boat be lowered: So we left him there to die.

He couldn’t have kept afloat for long an’ him lashed up ’n’ all, ’N’ we couldn’t see him for long, for the sea was blurred with the sleet ’n’ snow, ’N’ we couldn’t think of him much because o’ the snortin’, screamin’ squall. There was a hand less at the halliards ’n’ the braces, ’N’ a name less when the watch spoke to the muster-roll, ’N’ a empty bunk ’n’ a pannikin as wasn’t wanted When the watch went below.

A VALEDICTION (LIVERPOOL DOCKS)

A CRIMP. A DRUNKEN SAILOR.

_Is there anything as I can do ashore for you_ _When you’ve dropped down the tide?_--

You can take ’n’ tell Nan I’m goin’ about the world agen ’N’ that the world’s wide. ’N’ tell her that there ain’t no postal service Not down on the blue sea. ’N’ tell her that she’d best not keep her fires alight Nor set up late for me. ’N’ tell her I’ll have forgotten all about her Afore we cross the Line. ’N’ tell her that the dollars of any other sailor-man Is as good red gold as mine.

_Is there anything as I can do aboard for you_ _Afore the tow-rope’s taut?_

I’m new to this packet and all the ways of her, ’N’ I don’t know of aught; But I knows as I’m goin’ down to the seas agen ’N’ the seas are salt ’n’ drear; But I knows as all the doin’ as you’re man enough for Won’t make them lager-beer.

_’N’ ain’t there_ nothin’ _as I can do ashore for you_ _When you’ve got fair afloat?_--

You can buy a farm with the dollars as you’ve done me of ’N’ cash my advance-note.

_Is there anythin’ you’d fancy for your breakfastin’_ _When you’re home across Mersey Bar?_--

I wants a red herrin’ n’ a prairie oyster ’N’ a bucket of Three Star, ’N’ a gell with redder lips than Polly has got, ’N’ prettier ways than Nan----

_Well, so-long, Billy, ’n’ a spankin’ heavy pay-day to you!_

So-long, my fancy man!

A NIGHT AT DAGO TOM’S

Oh yesterday, I t’ink it was, while cruisin’ down the street, I met with Bill.--‘Hullo,’ he says, ‘let’s give the girls a treat.’ We’d red bandanas round our necks ’n’ our shrouds new rattled down, So we filled a couple of Santy Cruz and cleared for Sailor Town.

We scooted south with a press of sail till we fetched to a caboose, The ‘Sailor’s Rest,’ by Dago Tom, alongside ‘Paddy’s Goose.’ Red curtains to the windies, ay, ’n’ white sand to the floor, And an old blind fiddler liltin’ the tune of ‘Lowlands no more.’

He played the ‘Shaking of the Sheets’ ’n’ the couples did advance, Bowing, stamping, curtsying, in the shuffling of the dance; The old floor rocked and quivered, so it struck beholders dumb, ’N’ arterwards there was sweet songs ’n’ good Jamaikey rum.

’N’ there was many a merry yarn of many a merry spree Aboard the ships with royals set a-sailing on the sea, Yarns of the hooker ‘Spindrift,’ her as had the clipper-bow,-- ‘There ain’t no ships,’ says Bill to me, ‘like that there hooker now.’

When the old blind fiddler played the tune of ‘Pipe the Watch Below,’ The skew-eyed landlord dowsed the glim and bade us ‘stamp ’n’ go,’ ’N’ we linked it home, did Bill ’n’ I, adown the scattered streets, Until we fetched to Land o’ Nod atween the linen sheets.

‘PORT OF MANY SHIPS’

‘It’s a sunny pleasant anchorage, is Kingdom Come, Where crews is always layin’ aft for double-tots o’ rum, ’N’ there’s dancin’ ’n’ fiddlin’ of ev’ry kind o’ sort, It’s a fine place for sailor-men is that there port. ’N’ I wish-- I wish as I was there.

‘The winds is never nothin’ more than jest light airs, ’N’ no-one gets belayin’-pinned, ’n’ no-one never swears, Yer free to loaf an’ laze around, yer pipe atween yer lips, Lollin’ on the fo’c’s’le, sonny, lookin’ at the ships. ’N’ I wish-- I wish as I was there.

‘For ridin’ in the anchorage the ships of all the world Have got one anchor down ’n’ all sails furled. All the sunken hookers ’n’ the crews as took ’n’ died They lays there merry, sonny, swingin’ to the tide. ’N’ I wish-- I wish as I was there.

‘Drowned old wooden hookers green wi’ drippin’ wrack, Ships as never fetched to port, as never came back, Swingin’ to the blushin’ tide, dippin’ to the swell, ’N’ the crews all singin’, sonny, beatin’ on the bell. ’N’ I wish-- I wish as I was there.

CAPE HORN GOSPEL--I

‘I was in a hooker once,’ said Karlssen, ‘And Bill, as was a seaman, died, So we lashed him in an old tarpaulin And tumbled him across the side; And the fun of it was that all his gear was Divided up among the crew Before that blushing human error, Our crawling little captain, knew.

‘On the passage home one morning (As certain as I prays for grace) There was old Bill’s shadder a-hauling At the weather mizzen-topsail brace. He was all grown green with sea-weed, He was all lashed up and shored; So I says to him, I says, “Why, Billy! What’s a-bringin’ of you back aboard?”

’“I’m a-weary of them there mermaids,” Says old Bill’s ghost to me; “It ain’t no place for a Christian Below there--under sea. For it’s all blown sand and shipwrecks, And old bones eaten bare, And them cold fishy females With long green weeds for hair.

’“And there ain’t no dances shuffled, And no old yarns is spun, And there ain’t no stars but starfish, And never any moon or sun. I heard your keel a-passing And the running rattle of the brace,” And he says, “Stand by,” says William, “For a shift towards a better place.”

‘Well, he sogered about decks till sunrise, When a rooster in the hen-coop crowed, And as so much smoke he faded And as so much smoke he goed; And I’ve often wondered since, Jan, How his old ghost stands to fare Long o’ them cold fishy females With long green weeds for hair.’

CAPE HORN GOSPEL--II

Jake was a dirty Dago lad, an’ he gave the skipper chin, An’ the skipper up an’ took him a crack with an iron belaying-pin Which stiffened him out a rusty corp, as pretty as you could wish, An’ then we shovelled him up in a sack an’ dumped him to the fish. That was jest arter we’d got sail on her.

Josey slipped from the tops’l-yard an’ bust his bloody back (Which corned from playing the giddy goat an’ leavin’ go the jack); We lashed his chips in clouts of sail an’ ballasted him with stones, ‘The Lord hath taken away,’ we says, an’ we give him to Davy Jones. An’ that was afore we were up with the Line.

Joe were chippin’ a rusty plate a-squattin’ upon the deck, An’ all the watch he had the sun a-singein’ him on the neck, An’ forrard he falls at last, he does, an’ he lets his mallet go, Dead as a nail with a calenture, an’ that was the end of Joe. An’ that was just afore we made the Plate.

All o’ the rest were sailor-men, an’ it come to rain an’ squall, An’ then it was halliards, sheets, an ’tacks ‘clue up, an’ let go all.’ We snugged her down an’ hove her to, an’ the old contrairy cuss Started a plate, an’ settled an’ sank, an’ that was the end of us.

We slopped around on coops an’ planks in the cold an’ in the dark, An’ Bill were drowned, an’ Tom were ate by a swine of a cruel shark, An’ a mail-boat reskied Harry an’ I (which comed of pious prayers), Which brings me here a-kickin’ my heels in the port of Buenos Ayres.

I’m bound for home in the ‘Oronook,’ in a suit of looted duds, A D.B.S. a-earnin’ a stake by helpin’ peelin’ spuds, An’ if ever I fetch to Prince’s Stage an’ sets my feet ashore, You bet your hide that there I stay, an’ follers the sea no more.

MOTHER CAREY

(AS TOLD ME BY THE BO’SUN)

Mother Carey? She’s the mother o’ the witches ’N’ all _them_ sort o’ rips; She’s a fine gell to look at, but the hitch is, She’s a sight too fond of ships. She lives upon a iceberg to the norred, ’N’ her man he’s Davy Jones, ’N’ she combs the weeds upon her forred With pore drowned sailors’ bones.

She’s the mother o’ the wrecks, ’n’ the mother Of all big winds as blows; She’s up to some deviltry or other When it storms, or sleets, or snows. The noise of the wind’s her screamin’, ‘I’m arter a plump, young, fine, Brass-buttoned, beefy-ribbed young seam’n So as me ’n’ my mate kin dine.’

She’s a hungry old rip ’n’ a cruel For sailor-men like we, She’s give a many mariners the gruel ’N’ a long sleep under sea. She’s the blood o’ many a crew upon her ’N’ the bones of many a wreck, ’N’ she’s barnacles a-growin’ on her ’N’ shark’s teeth round her neck.

I ain’t never had no schoolin’ Nor read no books like you, But I knows ’t ain’t healthy to be foolin’ With that there gristly two. You’re young, you thinks, ’n’ you’re lairy, But if you’re to make old bones, Steer clear, I says, o’ Mother Carey, ’N’ that there Davy Jones.

EVENING--REGATTA DAY

Your nose is a red jelly, your mouth’s a toothless wreck, And I’m atop of you, banging your head upon the dirty deck; And both your eyes are bunged and blind like those of a mewling pup, For you’re the juggins who caught the crab and lost the ship the Cup.

He caught a crab in the spurt home, this blushing cherub did, And the ‘Craigie’s’ whaler slipped ahead like a cart-wheel on the skid, And beat us fair by a boat’s nose though we sweated fit to start her, So we are playing at Nero now, and _he’s_ the Christian martyr.

And Stroke is lashing a bunch of keys to the buckle-end a belt, And we’re going to lay you over a chest and baste you till you melt. The ‘Craigie’ boys are beating the bell and cheering down the tier, D’ye hear, you Port Mahone baboon, I ask you, do you _hear_?

A VALEDICTION

We’re bound for blue water where the great winds blow, It’s time to get the tacks aboard, time for us to go; The crowd’s at the capstan and the tune’s in the shout, ‘A long pull, a strong pull, _and warp the hooker out_.’

The bow-wash is eddying, spreading from the bows, Aloft and loose the topsails and some one give a rouse; A salt Atlantic chanty shall be music to the dead, ‘A long pull, a strong pull, _and the yard to the mast-head_.’

Green and merry run the seas, the wind comes cold, Salt and strong and pleasant, and worth a mint of gold; And she’s staggering, swooping, as she feels her feet, ‘A long pull, a strong pull, _and aft the main-sheet_.’

Shrilly squeal the running sheaves, the weather-gear strains, Such a clatter of chain-sheets, the devil’s in the chains; Over us the bright stars, under us the drowned, ‘A long pull, a strong pull, _and we’re outward bound_.’

Yonder, round and ruddy, is the mellow old moon, The red-funnelled tug has gone, and now, sonny, soon We’ll be clear of the Channel, so watch how you steer, ‘Ease her when she pitches, _and so-long, my dear_.’

A PIER-HEAD CHORUS

Oh I’ll be chewing salted horse and biting flinty bread, And dancing with the stars to watch, upon the fo’c’s’le head, Hearkening to the bow-wash and the welter of the tread Of a thousand tons of clipper running free.

For the tug has got the tow-rope and will take us to the Downs, Her paddles churn the river-wrack to muddy greens and browns, And I have given river-wrack and all the filth of towns For the rolling, combing cresters of the sea.

We’ll sheet the mizzen-royals home and shimmer down the Bay, The sea-line blue with billows, the land-line blurred and grey; The bow-wash will be piling high and thrashing into spray, As the hooker’s fore-foot tramples down the swell.

She’ll log a giddy seventeen and rattle out the reel, The weight of all the run-out line will be a thing to feel, As the bacca-quidding shell-back shambles aft to take the wheel, And the sea-sick little middy strikes the bell.

THE GOLDEN CITY OF ST. MARY

Out beyond the sunset, could I but find the way, Is a sleepy blue laguna which widens to a bay, And there’s the Blessed City--so the sailors say-- The Golden City of St. Mary.

It’s built of fair marble--white--without a stain, And in the cool twilight when the sea-winds wane The bells chime faintly, like a soft, warm rain, In the Golden City of St. Mary.

Among the green palm-trees where the fire-flies shine, Are the white tavern tables where the gallants dine, Singing slow Spanish songs like old mulled wine, In the Golden City of St. Mary.

Oh I’ll be shipping sunset-wards and westward-ho Through the green toppling combers a-shattering into snow, Till I come to quiet moorings and a watch below, In the Golden City of St. Mary.

TRADE WINDS

In the harbour, in the island, in the Spanish Seas, Are the tiny white houses and the orange-trees, And day-long, night long, the cool and pleasant breeze Of the steady Trade Winds blowing.

There is the red wine, the nutty Spanish ale, The shuffle of the dancers, the old salt’s tale, The squeaking fiddle, and the soughing in the sail Of the steady Trade Winds blowing.

And o’ nights there’s fire-flies and the yellow moon, And in the ghostly palm-trees the sleepy tune Of the quiet voice calling me, the long low croon Of the steady Trade Winds blowing.

SEA-FEVER

I must down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky, And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by, And the wheel’s kick and the wind’s song and the white sail’s shaking, And a grey mist on the sea’s face and a grey dawn breaking.

I must down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied; And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying, And the flung spray and the blown spume, and the sea-gulls crying.

I must down to the seas again to the vagrant gypsy life, To the gull’s way and the whale’s way where the wind’s like a whetted knife; And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow-rover, And quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick’s over.

A WANDERER’S SONG

A wind’s in the heart of me, a fire’s in my heels, I am tired of brick and stone and rumbling wagon-wheels; I hunger for the sea’s edge, the limits of the land, Where the wild old Atlantic is shouting on the sand.

Oh I’ll be going, leaving the noises of the street, To where a lifting foresail-foot is yanking at the sheet; To a windy, tossing anchorage where yawls and ketches ride, Oh I’ll be going, going, until I meet the tide.

And first I’ll hear the sea-wind, the mewing of the gulls, The clucking, sucking of the sea about the rusty hulls, The songs at the capstan in the hooker warping out, And then the heart of me’ll know I’m there or thereabout.

Oh I am tired of brick and stone, the heart of me is sick, For windy green, unquiet sea, the realm of Moby Dick; And I’ll be going, going, from the roaring of the wheels, For a wind’s in the heart of me, a fire’s in my heels.

CARDIGAN BAY

Clean, green, windy billows notching out the sky, Grey clouds tattered into rags, sea-winds blowing high, And the ships under topsails, beating, thrashing by, And the mewing of the herring gulls.

Dancing, flashing green seas shaking white locks, Boiling in blind eddies over hidden rocks, And the wind in the rigging, the creaking of the blocks, And the straining of the timber hulls.

Delicate, cool sea-weeds, green and amber-brown, In beds where shaken sunlight slowly filters down On many a drowned seventy-four, many a sunken town, And the whitening of the dead men’s skulls.

CHRISTMAS EVE AT SEA

A wind is rustling ‘south and soft,’ Cooing a quiet country tune, The calm sea sighs, and far aloft The sails are ghostly in the moon.

Unquiet ripples lisp and purr, A block there pipes and chirps i’ the sheave, The wheel-ropes jar, the reef-points stir Faintly--and it is Christmas Eve.

The hushed sea seems to hold her breath, And o’er the giddy, swaying spars, Silent and excellent as Death, The dim blue skies are bright with stars.

Dear God--they shone in Palestine Like this, and yon pale moon serene Looked down among the lowing kine On Mary and the Nazarene.

The angels called from deep to deep, The burning heavens felt the thrill, Startling the flocks of silly sheep And lonely shepherds on the hill.

To-night beneath the dripping bows Where flashing bubbles burst and throng, The bow-wash murmurs and sighs and soughs A message from the angels’ song.

The moon goes nodding down the west, The drowsy helmsman strikes the bell; _Rex Judæorum natus est_, I charge you, brothers, sing _Nowell, Nowell,_ _Rex Judæorum natus est_.

A BALLAD OF CAPE ST. VINCENT

Now, Bill, ain’t it prime to be a-sailin’, Slippin’ easy, splashin’ up the sea, Dossin’ snug aneath the weather-railin’, Quiddin’ bonded Jacky out a-lee? English sea astern us and afore us, Reaching out three thousand miles ahead, God’s own stars a-risin’ solemn o’er us, And--yonder’s Cape St. Vincent and the Dead.

There they lie, Bill, man and mate together, Dreamin’ out the dog-watch down below, Anchored in the Port of Pleasant Weather, Waiting for the Bo’sun’s call to blow. Over them the tide goes lappin’, swayin’, Under them’s the wide bay’s muddy bed, And it’s pleasant dreams--to them--to hear us sayin’, Yonder’s Cape St. Vincent and the Dead.

Hear that P. and O. boat’s engines dronin’, Beating out of time and out of tune, Ripping past with every plate a-groanin’, Spitting smoke and cinders at the moon? Ports a-lit like little stars a-settin’, See ’em glintin’ yaller, green, and red, Loggin’ twenty knots, Bill,--but forgettin’, Yonder’s Cape St. Vincent and the Dead.

They’re ‘discharged’ now, Billy, ‘left the service,’ Rough an’ bitter was the watch they stood, Drake an’ Blake, an’ Collingwood an’ Jervis, Nelson, Rodney, Hawke, an’ Howe an’ Hood. They’d a hard time, haulin’ an’ directin’, There’s the flag they left us, Billy--tread Straight an’ keep it flyin’--recollectin’, Yonder’s Cape St. Vincent and the Dead.

THE TARRY BUCCANEER

I’m going to be a pirate with a bright brass pivot-gun, And an island in the Spanish Main beyond the setting sun, And a silver flagon full of red wine to drink when work is done, Like a fine old salt-sea scavenger, like a tarry Buccaneer.

With a sandy creek to careen in, and a pig-tailed Spanish mate, And under my main-hatches a sparkling merry freight Of doubloons and double moidores and pieces of eight, Like a fine old salt-sea scavenger, like a tarry Buccaneer.

With a taste for Spanish wine-shops and for spending my doubloons, And a crew of swart mulattoes and black-eyed octoroons, And a thoughtful way with mutineers of making them maroons, Like a fine old salt-sea scavenger, like a tarry Buccaneer.

With a sash of crimson velvet and a diamond-hilted sword, And a silver whistle about my neck secured to a golden cord, And a habit of taking captives and walking them along a board, Like a fine old salt-sea scavenger, like a tarry Buccaneer.

With a spy-glass tucked beneath my arm and a cocked hat cocked askew, And a long low rakish schooner a-cutting of the waves in two, And a flag of skull and cross-bones the wickedest that ever flew, Like a fine old salt-sea scavenger, like a tarry Buccaneer.

A BALLAD OF JOHN SILVER

We were schooner-rigged and rakish, with a long and lissome hull, And we flew the pretty colours of the cross-bones and the skull; We’d a big black Jolly Roger flapping grimly at the fore, And we sailed the Spanish Water in the happy days of yore.

We’d a long brass gun amidships, like a well-conducted ship, We had each a brace of pistols and a cutlass at the hip; It’s a point which tells against us, and a fact to be deplored, But we chased the goodly merchant-men and laid their ships aboard.

Then the dead men fouled the scuppers and the wounded filled the chains, And the paint-work all was spatter-dashed with other people’s brains, She was boarded, she was looted, she was scuttled till she sank, And the pale survivors left us by the medium of the plank.

O! then it was (while standing by the taffrail on the poop) We could hear the drowning folk lament the absent chicken-coop; Then, having washed the blood away, we’d little else to do Than to dance a quiet hornpipe as the old salts taught us to.