And Othere, the old sea-captain, And to the King of the Saxons, In witness of the truth, Raising his noble head, He stretched his brown hand, and said, "Behold this walrus-tooth!" LONGFELLOW. BALBOA. FROM San Domingo's crowded wharf Fernandez' vessel bore, To seek in unknown lands afar And hid among the freighted casks, But, when the fading town and land "What villain thou?" Fernandez cried, "And wherefore serve us so?" "To be thy follower," he replied, Three hundred years ago. He wore a manly form and face, His words fell on his comrades' hearts They saw not his ambitious soul; He stood among the common ranks But when Fernandez' vessel lay At golden Darien, A murmur, born of discontent, Grew loud among the men: And with the word there came the act; They raised Balboa from the ranks, And, while he took command beneath The banner of his lord, A mighty purpose grasped his soul, As he had grasped the sword. He saw the mountain's far blue height, Whence golden waters flow; Then with his men he scaled the crags Three hundred years ago. He led them up through tangled brakes, The rivulet's smiling bed, And through the storm of poisoned darts From many an ambush shed. He gained the turret crag-alone- An ocean boundless and unknown, And, while he raised upon that height The mighty purpose grasped him still, Then down he rushed with all his men, And plunged knee-deep into the sea, And, while he held above his head He waved his gleaming sword and smote "For Rome! for Leon! and Castile !" Thrice gave the cleaving blow; Three hundred years ago. T. BUCHANAN READ. HENRICH HUDSON.* THE Slayer, DEATH, is everywhere, and many a mask hath he, Many and awful are the shapes in which he rules the sea; Sometimes within a rocky aisle he lights his candle dim, And sits half sheeted in the foarn, chanting a funeral hymn ; Full often 'mid the roar of winds we hear his awful cry Guiding the lightning to its prey thro' the beclouded sky; Sometimes he hides 'neath tropic waves, and as the ship sails o'er He holds her fast to the fiery sun, till the crew can breathe no more. * The narrative of the following stanzas is contained, more briefly, in two pages of Bancroft's History of the 'Colonization of America ;' vol. ii. The main facts—the open boat, the seven sick seamen, and the fidelity of one of the crew, named Phillip Staafe, are literally as stated by the poet. The actual consummation of such a voyage, in such a latitude, can easily be conceived. There is no land so far away but he meeteth mankind there He liveth at the icy pole with the Berg and the shaggy Bear, He smileth from the Southron capes like a May Queen in her flowers, He falleth o'er the Indian seas, dissolved in summer showers; But of all the sea-shapes he hath worn, may mariners never know Such fate as Henrich Hudson found, in the labyrinths of snow The North Sea's great Columbus, whose bones lie far, interred Under those frigid waters where no song was ever heard. 'Twas when he sailed from Amsterdam, in the adven turous quest Of an ice-shored strait, thro' which to reach the far and fabled West; His dastard crew-their thin blood chilled beneath the arctic sky Combined against him in the night; his hands and feet they tie, And bind him in a helmless boat on that dread sea to sailAh, me an oarless shadowy skiff, as a schoolboy's vessel frail. Seven sick men, and his only son, his comrades were to be, But ere they left the 'Crescent's' side, the chief spoke dauntlessly: |