Attempt to steer obliquely on the gale;
For then, if broaching sideway to the sea,
Our dropsied ship may founder by the lee;
Vain all endeavours then to bear away,
Nor helm, nor pilot, would she more obey."
He said the listening mates with fix'd regard And silent reverence, his opinion heard;
Important was the question in debate,
And o'er their counsels hung impending fate :
Rodmond, in many a scene of peril tried,
Had oft the master's happier skill descried,
Yet now, the hour, the scene, the occasion known,
Perhaps with equal right preferr'd his own ;.
Of long experience in the naval art,
Blunt was his speech, and naked was his heart;
Alike to him each climate, and each blast,
The first in danger, in retreat the last:
Sagacious, balancing the opposed events,
From Albert his opinion thus dissents :-
"Too true the perils of the present hour,
Where toils succeeding toils our strength o'erpower!
Our bark, 'tis true, no shelter here can find,
Sore shatter'd by the ruffian seas and wind:
Yet where with safety can we dare to scud
Before this tempest, and pursuing flood?
At random driven, to present death we haste,
And one short hour perhaps may be our last :
Though Corinth's gulf extend along the lee,
To whose safe ports appears a passage free,
Yet think this furious unremitting gale
Deprives the ship of every ruling sail;
And if before it she directly flies,
New ills enclose us and new dangers rise:
Here Falconera spreads her lurking snares,
There distant Greece her rugged shelves prepares;
Our hull, if once it strikes that iron coast,
Asunder bursts, in instant ruin lost;
Nor she alone, but with her all the crew,
Beyond relief, are doom'd to perish too :
Such mischiefs follow if we bear away;
O safer that sad refuge-to delay!
"Then of our purpose this appears the scope, To weigh the danger with the doubtful hope : Though sorely buffeted by every sea,
Our hull unbroken long may try a-lee;
The crew,
though harass'd much with toils severe,
Still at their pumps, perceive no hazards near:
Shall we, incautious, then the danger tell,
At once their courage and their hope to quell?
Prudence forbids! this southern tempest soon
May change its quarter with the changing moon;
Its rage, though terrible, may soon subside,
Nor into mountains lash the unruly tide:
These leaks shall then decrease-the sails once
Direct our course to some relieving shore."
Thus while he spoke, around from man to man At either pump a hollow murmur ran :
For, while the vessel through unnumber'd chinks,
Above, below, the invading water drinks,
Sounding her depth they eyed the wetted scale,
And lo! the leaks o'er all their powers prevail :
Yet at their post, by terrors unsubdued,
They with redoubling force their task pursued.
And now the senior pilots seem'd to wait
Arion's voice, to close the dark debate:
Not o'er his vernal life the ripening sun
Had yet progressive twice ten summers run;
Slow to debate, yet eager to excel,
In thy sad school, stern Neptune! taught too well:
With lasting pain to rend his youthful heart
Dire fate in venom dipt her keenest dart ;
Till his firm spirit, temper'd long to ill,
Forgot her persecuting scourge to feel:
But now the horrors, that around him roll,
Thus roused to action his rekindling soul:
"Can we, delay'd in this tremendous tide,
A moment pause what purpose to decide?
Alas! from circling horrors thus combined,
One method of relief alone we find :
Thus water-logg'd, thus helpless to remain
Amid this hollow, how ill judged! how vain!
Our sea-breach'd vessel can no longer bear
The floods, that o'er her burst in dread career;
The labouring hull already seems half-fill'd
With water through a hundred leaks distill'd;
Thus drench'd by every wave, her riven deck,
Stript, and defenceless, floats a naked wreck;
At every pitch the o'erwhelming billows bend
Beneath their load the quivering bowsprit's end;
A fearful warning! since the masts on high
On that support with trembling hope rely;
At either pump our seamen pant for breath,
In dire dismay, anticipating death;
Still all our powers the increasing leaks defy,
We sink at sea, no shore, no haven nigh:
One dawn of hope yet breaks athwart the gloom
To light and save us from a watery tomb;
That bids us shun the death impending here,
Fly from the following blast, and shoreward steer
""Tis urged indeed, the fury of the gale
Precludes the help of every guiding sail;
And, driven before it on the watery waste,
To rocky shores and scenes of death we haste;
But haply Falconera we may shun,
And long to Grecian coasts is yet the run :
Less harass'd then, our scudding ship may bear
The assaulting surge repell'd upon her rear,
And since as soon that tempest may decay
When steering shoreward-wherefore thus delay?
Should we at last be driven by dire decree
Too near the fatal margin of the sea,
The hull dismasted there awhile may ride
With lengthen'd cables, on the raging tide;
Perhaps kind Heaven, with interposing power,
May curb the tempest ere that dreadful hour;
But here, ingulf'd and foundering, while we stay,
Fate hovers o'er and marks us for her prey."
He said: Palemon saw with grief of heart
The storm prevailing o'er the pilot's art;
In silent terror and distress involved,
He heard their last alternative resolved:
High beat his bosom-with such fear subdued,
Beneath the gloom of some enchanted wood,
Oft in old time the wandering swain explored
The midnight wizards, breathing rites abhorr'd;
Trembling, approach'd their incantations fell,
And, chill'd with horror, heard the songs of hell.
Arion saw, with secret anguish moved,
The deep affliction of the friend he loved,
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