_MARI MAGNO or TALES ON BOARD._[16] A youth was I. An elder friend with me, ’Twas in September o’er the autumnal sea We went; the wide Atlantic ocean o’er Two amongst many the strong steamer bore. Delight it was to feel that wondrous force That held us steady to our proposed course, The burning resolute victorious will ’Gainst winds and waves that strive unwavering still. Delight it was with each returning day To learn the ship had won upon her way Her sum of miles,—delight were mornings grey And gorgeous eves,—nor was it less delight, On each more temperate and favouring night, Friend with familiar or with new-found friend, To pace the deck, and o’er the bulwarks bend, And the night watches in long converse spend; While still new subjects and new thoughts arise Amidst the silence of the seas and skies. Amongst the mingled multitude a few, Some three or four, towards us early drew; We proved each other with a day or two; Night after night some three or four we walked And talked, and talked, and infinitely talked. Of the New England ancient blood was one; His youthful spurs in letters he had won, Unspoilt by that, to Europe late had come,— Hope long deferred,—and went unspoilt by Europe home. What racy tales of Yankeeland he had! Up-country girl, up-country farmer lad; The regnant clergy of the time of old In wig and gown;—tales not to be retold By me. I could but spoil were I to tell: Himself must do it who can do it well. An English clergyman came spick and span In black and white—a large well-favoured man, Fifty years old, as near as one could guess. He looked the dignitary more or less. A rural dean, I said, he was, at least, Canon perhaps; at many a good man’s feast A guest had been, amongst the choicest there. Manly his voice and manly was his air: At the first sight you felt he had not known The things pertaining to his cloth alone. Chairman of Quarter Sessions had he been? Serious and calm, ’twas plain he much had seen, Had miscellaneous large experience had Of human acts, good, half and half, and bad. Serious and calm, yet lurked, I know not why, At times, a softness in his voice and eye. Some shade of ill a prosperous life had crossed; Married no doubt: a wife or child had lost? He never told us why he passed the sea. My guardian friend was now, at thirty-three, A rising lawyer—ever, at the best, Slow rises worth in lawyer’s gown compressed; Succeeding now, yet just, and only just, His new success he never seemed to trust. By nature he to gentlest thoughts inclined, To most severe had disciplined his mind; He held it duty to be half unkind. Bitter, they said, who but the exterior knew; In friendship never was a friend so true: The unwelcome fact he did not shrink to tell, The good, if fact, he recognised as well. Stout to maintain, if not the first to see; In conversation who so great as he?