I saw, and clearly saw, the living light Which sailors everywhere as sacred hold In time of storm and crossing winds that fight, Of tempest dark and desperation cold; Nor less it was to all a marvel quite, And matter surely to alarm the bold, To observe the sea-clouds, with a tube immense, Suck water up from Ocean's deep expanse.... A fume or vapour thin and subtle rose, And by the wind begin revolving there; Thence to the topmost clouds a tube it throws, But of a substance so exceeding rare.... But when it was quite gorged it then withdrew The foot that on the sea beneath had grown, And o'er the heavens in fine it raining flew, The jacent waters watering with its own. The storm at sea reminds us of Æschylus in splendour: The winds were such, that scarcely could they shew With greater force or greater rage around, Than if it were this purpose then to blow The mighty tower of Babel to the ground.... Now rising to the clouds they seem to go O'er the wild waves of Neptune borne on end; Now to the bowels of the deep below; It seems to all their senses, they descend; Notus and Auster, Boreas, Aquila, The very world's machinery would rend; While flashings fire the black and ugly night And shed from pole to pole a dazzling light.... But now the star of love beamed forth its ray, Before the sun, upon the horizon clear, And visited, as messenger of day, The earth and spreading sea, with brow to cheer.... And, as it subsides: The mountains that we saw at first appeared, In the far view, like clouds and nothing more. Off the coast of India: Now o'er the hills broke forth the morning light Where Ganges' stream is murmuring heard to flow, Free from the storm and from the first sea's fight, Vain terror from their hearts is banished now. His magic island, the Ilha of Venus, could only have been imagined by a poet who had travelled widely. All the delights of the New World are there, with the vegetation of Southern Europe added. It is a poet's triumphant rendering of impressions which the discoverers so often felt their inability to convey: