So these were wed and merrily rang the bells, Merrily rang the bells and they were wed. But never merrily beat Annie's heart. A footstep seem'd to fall beside her path, She knew not whence; a whisper in her ear, She knew not what; nor loved she to be left Alone at home, nor ventured out alone. What ail'd her then, that ere she enter'd, often Her hand dwelt lingeringly on the latch, Fearing to enter: Philip thought he knew: Such doubts and fears were common to her state, Being with child: but when her child was born, Then her new child was as herself renew'd, Then the new mother came about her heart, Then her good Philip was her all-in-all, And that mysterious instinct wholly died. And where was Enoch? prosperously sail'd The ship 'Good Fortune,' tho' at setting forth The Biscay, roughly ridging eastward, shook And almost overwhelm'd her, yet unvext She slipt across the summer of the world, Then after a long tumble about the Cape And frequent interchange of foul and fair, She passing thro' the summer world again, The breath of heaven came continually And sent her sweetly by the golden isles, Till silent in her oriental haven. There Enoch traded for himself, and bought Quaint monsters for the market of those times, A gilded dragon, also, for the babes. Less lucky her home-voyage: at first indeed Thro' many a fair sea-circle, day by day, Scarce-rocking, her full-busted figure-head Stared o'er the ripple feathering from her bows: Then follow'd calms, and then winds variable, Then baffling, a long course of them; and last Storm, such as drove her under moonless heavens Till hard upon the cry of 'breakers' came The crash of ruin, and the loss of all But Enoch and two others. Half the night, Buoy'd upon floating tackle and broken spars, These drifted, stranding on an isle at morn Rich, but loneliest in a lonely sea. No want was there of human sustenance, Soft fruitage, mighty nuts, and nourishing roots; Nor save for pity was it hard to take The helpless life so wild that it was tame. There in a seaward-gazing mountain-gorge They built, and thatch'd with leaves of palm, a hut, Half hut, half native cavern. So the three, Set in this Eden of all plenteousness, Dwelt with eternal summer, ill-content. For one, the youngest, hardly more than boy, Hurt in that night of sudden ruin and wreck, Lay lingering out a three-years' death-in-life. They could not leave him. After he was gone, The two remaining found a fallen stem; And Enoch's comrade, careless of himself, Fire-hollowing this in Indian fashion, fell Sun-stricken, and that other lived alone. In those two deaths he read God's warning 'wait.'