Brought forth —away they spring,
And headlong in the whelming tide,
Rescued from thee, their sorrows hide
Beneath the halcyon's wing.

• There came an angel of eclipse, Who haunts at times the Atlantic flood, And smites with blindness, on their ships, The captives and the men of blood:Here, in the hold, the blight began, From eye to eye contagion ran; »Sight, as with burning brands, was quench'd

None from the fiery trial blench'd,

But panting for release, They call'd on Death, who, close behind, Summon'd the plague, to lead the blind From agony to peace. That pestilence no power could check;
Unseen its withering arrows flew;
It walk'd in silence on the deck,
And smote from stem to stern the crew:
As glow-worms dwindle in the shade,
As lamps in charnel-houses fade,
From every orb, with vision fired,
In flitting sparks the light retired:
The sufferers saw it go;
And o'er the ship, the sea, the skies,
Pursued it with their failing eyes,
Till all was black below. A murmur swell'd along the gale;All rose, and held their breath to heap;

All look'd, but none could spy a sail, And yet they knew a sail was near:"Help! help!" our beckoning sailors cried;

"Help ! help !" a hundred tongues replied:Then hideous clamour rent the air, Questions and answers of despair:Few words the mystery clear'd;

The plague had found that second bark, Where every eye but his was dark Whose hand the vessel steer'd. He, wild with panic, turn'd away,
And thence his shrieking comrades bore;
From either ship the winds convey
Farewells, that soon are heard no more:
A calm of horror hush'd the waves;
Behold them !— merchant, seamen, slaves,
The blind, the dying, and the dead,
All help, all hope, for ever fled, Unseen, yet face to face!
Woe past, woe present, woe to come,
Held for a while each victim dumb,
—Impaled upon his place.

It is not in the blood of man
To crouch ingloriously to fate;Nature will struggle while she can;Misfortune makes her children great;The head, which lightning hath laid low,
Is hallow'd by the noble blow;The wretch, who yields a felon's breath,
Emerges from the cloud of death,
A spirit on the storm:But virtue, perishing unknown,
Watch'd by the eye of Heaven alone,
Is earth's least earthly form. What were the scenes on board that bark?The tragedy which none beheld?When (as the deluge bore the ark,)
By power invisible impell'd,
The keel went blindfold through the surge,
Where stream might drift or whirlwind urge:
Plague, famine, thirst, their numbers slew,
And frenzy seized the hardier few
Who yet were spared to try
How everlasting are the pangs,
When life upon a moment hangs.
And death stands mocking by.

* Imagination's daring glance May pierce that veil of mystery, As in the rapture of a trance, Things which no eye hath seen to see;And hear by fits along the gales, Screams, maniac-laughter, hollow wails:They stand, they lie, above, beneath, Groans of unpitied anguish breathe,
Tears unavailing shed;
Each, in abstraction of despair,
Seems to himself a hermit there,
Alive among the dead. Yet respite, — respite from his woes,
Even here, the conscious sufferer feels;
Worn down by torture to repose, Slumber the vanish'd world reveals:Ah! then the eyes, extinct in night, Again behold the blessed light; Ah! then the frame of rack'd disease Lays its delighted limbs at ease; Swift to his own dear land The unfetter'd slave with shouts returns j Hard by, his dreaming tyrant burns At sight of Cuba's strand. To blank reality they wake, In darkness opens every eye:Peace comes; the negro's heart-strings break, To him 'tis more than life to die;How feels, how fares the man of blood?In endless exile on the flood, Rapt, as though fiends his vessel steer'd, Things which he once believed and fear'd, —Then scorn'd as idle names,— Death, judgment, conscience, hell conspire, With thronging images of fire, To light up guilt in flames. Who cried for mercy in that hour,
And found it on the desert sea?
Who to the utmost grasp of power,
Wrestled with life's last enemy?
Who, Marius-like, defying fate,
(Marius on fallen Carthage,) sate?
Who, through a hurricane of fears,
Clung to the hopes of future years?
And who, with heart unquail'd,
Look'd from Time's trembling precipice
Down on Eternity's abyss,
Till brain and footing fail'd?

Is there among this crew not One,
One whom a widow'd mother bare,
Who mourns far off her only son,
And pours for him her soul in prayer?Even now,—when o'er his soften'd thought
Remembrance of her love is brought,
To soothe death's agony, and dart
A throb of comfort through his heart, —
Even now a mystic knell
Sounds through her pulse; — she lifts her eye,
Sees a pale spirit passing by,
And hears his voice—" farewell."

Mother and son shall meet no more:

—The floating tomb of its own dead, That ship shall never reach a shore;But far from track of seamen led, The sun shall watch it day by day, Careering on its lonely way;Month after month, the moon shine pale On falling mast and riven sail;The stars, from year to year, Mark the bulged flank, and sunken deck, Till not an atom of the wreck On ocean's face appear. "The case of a ship called Le Rodeur, was brought to light under circumstances which