The sea,

I ween, cannot be fanned

By evening freshness from the land,

For the land it is far

away:

But God hath willed that the sky-born breeze

In the centre of the loneliest seas

Should ever sport and play.

The mighty moon she sits above,
Encircled with a zone of love,

A zone of dim and tender light,
That makes her wakeful eye more bright:
She seems to shine with a sunny ray,
And the night looks like a mellowed day!
The gracious mistress of the main

Hath now an undisturbed reign,

And from her silent throne looks down, children of her own,

As

upon

On the waves that lend their gentle breast
In gladness for her couch of rest!

PROFESSOR WILSON.

NIGHT HYMN AT SEA.

NIGHT sinks on the wave,

Hollow gusts are sighing,
Sea-birds to their cave

Through the gloom are flying.

MIDNIGHT THOUGHTS AT SEA.

Oh! should storms come sweeping,
Thou in heaven unsleeping,

O'er thy children vigil keeping,
Hear, hear, and save!

Stars look o'er the sea,

Few, and sad, and shrouded,

Faith our light must be,

When all else is clouded.

Thou, whose voice came thrilling,

Wind and billow stilling,

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Speak once more! our prayer fulfilling— Power dwells with thee.

MRS HEMANS.

MIDNIGHT THOUGHTS AT SEA.

BORNE upon the ocean's foam,
Far from native land and home,
Midnight's curtain, dense with wrath,
Brooding o'er our venturous path,
While the mountain wave is rolling,
And the ship's bell faintly tolling;
Saviour! on the boisterous sea
Bid us rest secure in Thee.

Blast and surge conflicting, hoarse,
Sweep us on with headlong force;

And the bark, which tempests urge,
Moans and trembles at their scourge:
Yet, should wildest tempests swell,
Be Thou near, and all is well.
Saviour! on the stormy sea

Let us find repose in Thee.

Hearts there are with love that burn,
When to us afar they turn;

Eyes that show the rushing tear,
If our uttered names they hear:
Saviour! o'er the faithless main
Bring us to those homes again,
As the trembler, touched by Thee,
Safely trod the treacherous sea.

Wrecks are darkly spread below,
Where with lonely keel we go;
Gentle brows and bosoms brave
Those abysses richly pave:
If beneath the briny deep

We with them should coldly sleep,
Saviour! o'er the 'whelming sea
Take our ransomed souls to Thee.
MRS SIGOURNEY.

THE VARIOUS ASPECTS OF THE SEA.

3

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THE VARIOUS ASPECTS OF THE SEA.

TURN to the watery world!—but who to thee
(A wonder yet unviewed) shall paint-the Sea?
Various and vast, sublime in all its forms,

When lulled by zephyrs, or when roused by storms,
Its colours changing, when from clouds and sun
Shades after shades upon the surface run;
Embrowned and horrid now, and now serene
In limpid blue and evanescent green;
And oft the foggy banks on ocean lie,

Lift the fair sail, and cheat the experienced eye.
Be it the summer noon: a sandy space

The ebbing tide has left upon its place;
Then just the hot and stony beach above,
Light twinkling streams in bright confusion move;
(For, heated thus, the warmer air ascends,
And with the cooler in its fall contends);
Then the broad bosom of the ocean keeps
An equal motion, swelling as it sleeps,
Then slowly sinking; curling to the strand,
Faint, lazy waves o'ercreep the ridgy sand,
Or tap the tarry boat with gentle blow,
And back return in silence, smooth and slow.
Ships in the calm seem anchored; for they glide
On the still sea, urged solely by the tide.
Art thou not present, this calm scene before,
Where all beside is pebbly length of shore,

And far as eye can reach, it can discern no more?

CHANGES OF THE SEA.

MIGHTY Sea!

Cameleon-like thou changest, but there's love
In all thy change, and constant sympathy
With yonder sky, thy mistress; from her brow
Thou takest thy moods and wearest her colours

on

Thy faithful bosom-morning's milky white,
Noon's sapphire, or the saffron glow of eve;
And all thy balmier hours, fair element,
Have such divine complexion-crisped smiles,
Luxuriant heavings, and sweet whisperings-
That little is the wonder Love's own Queen
From thee of old was fabled to have sprung.
Creation's common! which no human power
Can parcel or enclose; the lordliest floods
And cataracts, that the tiny hands of man
Can tame, conduct, or bound, are drops of dew
To thee, that could'st subdue the earth itself,
And brook'st commandment from the heavens
alone

For marshalling thy waves.

Yet, potent Sea! How placidly thy moist lips speak even now Along yon sparkling shingles. Who can be So fanciless as to feel no gratitude

That power and grandeur can be so serene,