All these And many more were there, and all were young! There, as I brimmed their cups, I heard the voice Of Raleigh ringing across the smoke-wreathed room,-- "Ben, could you put a frigate on the stage, I've found a tragedy for you. Have you heard The true tale of Sir Humphrey Gilbert?" "No!" "Why, Ben, of all the tragical affairs Of the Ocean-sea, and of that other Ocean Where all men sail so blindly, and misjudge Their friends, their charts, their storms, their stars, their God, If there be truth in the blind crowder's song I bought in Bread Street for a penny, this Is the brief type and chronicle of them all. Listen!" Then Raleigh sent these rugged rhymes Of some blind crowder rolling in great waves Of passion across the gloom. At each refrain He sank his voice to a broad deep undertone, As if the distant roar of breaking surf Or the low thunder of eternal tides Filled up the pauses of the nearer storm, Storm against storm, a soul against the sea:-- A KNIGHT OF THE OCEAN-SEA Sir Humphrey Gilbert, hard of hand, Knight-in-chief of the Ocean-sea, Gazed from the rocks of his New Found Land And thought of the home where his heart would be. He gazed across the wintry waste That weltered and hissed like molten lead,-- "He saileth twice who saileth in haste! I'll wait the favour of Spring," he said. _Ever the more, ever the more, He heard the winds and the waves roar! Thunder on thunder shook the shore._ The yellow clots of foam went by Like shavings that curl from a ship-wright's plane, Clinging and flying, afar and nigh, Shuddering, flying and clinging again. A thousand bubbles in every one Shifted and shimmered with rainbow gleams; But--had they been planets and stars that spun He had let them drift by his feet like dreams: Heavy of heart was our Admirall, For, out of his ships--and they were but three!-- He had lost the fairest and most tall, And--he was a Knight of the Ocean-sea. _Ever the more, ever the more, He heard the winds and the waves roar! Thunder on thunder shook the shore._ Heavy of heart, heavy of heart, For she was a galleon mighty as May, And the storm that ripped her glory apart Had stripped his soul for the winter's way; And he was aware of a whisper blown From foc'sle to poop, from windward to lee, That the fault was his, and his alone, And--he was a Knight of the Ocean-sea. "Had he done that! Had he done this!" And yet his mariners loved him well; But an idle word is hard to miss, And the foam hides more than the deep can tell.