[Illustration: Bliss Carman] While each of the poems develops differently, and taken alone has a symbolistic beauty that would fix itself in the memory, when the two are put together and are followed by two others cognate in theme, the lines of relief have melted into one indistinct image. This effect of blurring from the grouping of related poems is not so apparent in any collection as in the sea ballads, as the subject-matter of the other volumes is more diversified and the likelihood of employing somewhat the same imagery is therefore removed; but while Mr. Carman has a very witchery of phrase when singing of the sea, and his words sting one with delight like a dash of brine, one would, for that very reason, keep the impression vivid, forceful, complete, and grudges the merging of it into others and yet others that shall dissipate it or transform it to an impalpable thing. Judging them individually, it is doubtful if Mr. Carman has done anything more representative, more imbued with his own temperament, than these buoyant, quickening songs that freshen one as if from a plunge in the sea, and take one to themselves as intimately. The opening poem sets the key to the collection: I was born for deep-sea faring; I was bred to put to sea; Stories of my father’s daring Filled me at my mother’s knee. I was sired among the surges; I was cubbed beside the foam; All my heart is in its verges, And the sea wind is my home. All my boyhood, from far vernal Bourns of being, came to me Dream-like, plangent, and eternal Memories of the plunging sea. And what a gruesome, eerie fascination is in this picture at whose faithfulness one shudders: Oh, the shambling sea is a sexton old, And well his work is done. With an equal grave for lord and knave, He buries them every one. Then hoy and rip, with a rolling hip, He makes for the nearest shore; And God, who sent him a thousand ship, Will send him a thousand more; But some he’ll save for a bleaching grave, And shoulder them in to shore,— Shoulder them in, shoulder them in, Shoulder them in to shore. How the swing of the lines befits the action, and how it puts on grace in this stanza, Oh, the ships of Greece and the ships of Tyre Went out, and where are they? In the port they made, they are delayed With the ships of yesterday. The remaining strophes tempt one beyond what he is able, especially this characterization, Oh, a loafing, idle lubber to him Is the sexton of the town; but we must take a glance at the ballads, at the “Nancy’s Pride,” that went out On the long slow heave of a lazy sea, To the flap of an idle sail, * * * * * and … faded down With her creaking boom a-swing, Till a wind from the deep came up with a creep, And caught her wing and wing. * * * * *