University of Virginia Library

SCENE I.

(Forepart of the vessel.)
First Sailor.
This is the nineteenth day. This white-hot sun
Has stewed the sea to syrup.

Second Sailor.
And so thick
That this swift ship, inclosed in sticky coils,
Stands like a spoon that stands of its own self.

First Sailor.
The water in the barrels ebbs away:
Death's hand is tightening round our parching throats;
The curse of God is on us.

Second Sailor.
That was clear,
Even before the skeletons, like sharks,
Swam in the sunset in the vessel's wake;
Was it not I who saw the first one raise
His long white arm above the livid water,
And gave the alarm? The sun—dost thou remember?—
Was almost on a level with the wave;
A bright-red glare was thrown upon the sea,
All of a sudden, 'neath its bloodshot ball,
Just like the flag of crimson in the bull-ring,
Beneath the bull's wild eye. The whole sea glowed
A pool of new-shed blood. Then, one by one,
The skulls and arm-bones crested each small wave
Behind the vessel far as eye could reach,
Until it seemed as if the countless dead,
Who lie unburied in the ocean's depths,
Had risen to the surface, and gave chase;
But we outsailed them.

Third Sailor.
Then the great white fog
Off Cape Cardozo, when we saw the giants
That towered o'er the mast by head and shoulders
And loomed like monstrous shadows through the vapour,
Now lighter and now darker as they waded
Further or nearer round us. I remember
How Sanchez cried, ‘By luck! the vapour thickens:
If one of them should see us, he will pluck
The ship from out the water by the mast,
And whirl it like a sling about his head.’
How we escaped I know not.

First Sailor.
Nor do I.
But worse, I take it, was the Wind of Whispers,
That blew for three whole days in spite of prayer,
Of exorcism, and of holy water,
And said to each a different thing of horror,
In his own mother's voice, as if from far.
I know not what it may have said to thee;
But unto me it said nine times distinctly:
‘I see thee sinking through a hundred fathoms,
And fish swim after thee.’

Third Sailor.
Anon the moon
Will have her stare at us, as here we stick,
And make a mirror of the fetid sea,
And then the water-witches rising up
Will swim around the vessel as last night,
And croak their song of death. They came so close
As I was standing in the middle watch,
That I could see the wrinkles on their cheeks,
And on their knotty fingers.

Fourth Sailor.
Aye, last night
The sea-hags swam a-dance in all their number:
There must have been a hundred in the reel.
Their hair is old gray seaweed, and they wear
A necklace fashioned out of drowned men's teeth.
Some say they once were beautiful and young—
The whitest of the mermaids; but their lips
Betrayed the secret of the ocean gold,
So they were stricken old, and cursed for ever;
And now they work the mischief of the sea,
And stir up tempests with their spellful songs.
Down in their green and slimy ocean-caves,
They spin the thread of every vessel's voyage,
And where they cut the thread the ship goes down;
It's they who have becalmed us.

Fifth Sailor.
Look, the moon
Is cropping up above the water-line,
Round as a silver plate. And, by the Lord!
There are the hags already. Dost thou see?
Out there, just in the moonshine, right ahead,
One of them swimming like a fish that rolls.
And now a second and a third joins in.
Ho, ho! the lewd old sea-maids! how they play!
Thou'lt hear their singing when they all are there.

First Sailor.
What art thou looking at so hard, now that the waterhags have disappeared? Answer; what art thou staring at?

Second Sailor.
Look just a little to the left of the moon, on the waterline. What dost thou see?

First Sailor.
Very strange! It was not there half an hour ago. It has three peaks, with the valleys clear between them.

Second Sailor.
It is not twenty miles off. We must have drifted with an unfelt current. Call Diego. Where is the commander?

Third Sailor.
In his cabin, deep in thought.

First Sailor.
Thinking how to get us a little water for our cracking throats!

Third Sailor.
Yes, from the Fountain of Youth.