University of Virginia Library

236   O now it is not my grandmother's father there in      the fight ;
I feel it is I myself.
237  Stretch'd and still lies the midnight ;
Two great hulls motionless on the breast of the      darkness ;
Our vessel riddled and slowly sinking — preparations      to pass to the one we have conquer'd ;
The captain on the quarter-deck coldly giving his      orders through a countenance white as a sheet;
Near by, the corpse of the child that serv'd in the      cabin;
The dead face of an old salt with long white hair and      carefully curl'd whiskers;
The flames, spite of all that can be done, flickering      aloft and below;
The husky voices of the two or three officer yet fit      for duty; Formless stacks of bodies, and bodies by themselves —      dabs of flesh upon the masts and spars, Cut of cordage, dangle of rigging, slight shock of the      soothe of waves,
Black and impassive guns, litter of powder-parcels,      strong scent, Delicate sniffs of sea-breeze, smells of sedgy grass and      fields by the shore, death-messages given in      charge to survivors,
The hiss of the surgeon's knife, the gnawing teeth of      his saw,
Wheeze, cluck, swash of falling blood, short wild      scream, and long, dull, tapering groan ;
These so — these irretrievable.