10
Oh! how throbbed his heart as thro’ the grating
Criss-cross yard and rigging made him,
Through warm nights again the Southern Cross’s
Gleam of welcome calm surveyed him
As the ship, on Heaven’s blue vault designing,
Once again the slender palm-stems twining,
Nearer, nearer to his home conveyed him.
And the nearer, ofter sank in pensive
Dreams and reveries the ape.
Once he started—sure, there, in the distance
’Twas his homeland’s wooded cape!
But swift tempest’s fury long impending
Sudden burst with thunder music blending
Earth and sea and sky in one wild shape.
Oh! then on that ill-starred bark heartrending,
Were the tragedies achieved
By those wan-eyed singers, actors—ghastly
Fair the opera they weaved,
To which into drum and trumpet storming
Tempest played the ouverture performing;
Feats of art e’en Wagner ne’er conceived.
Hanuman from that wild tumult clambered
To the main mast—terrors blight—
Thunder deafens—stoops the groaning top-mast,
It the surge-foams drift and bite;
And with that small ape, firm hold maintaining,
Wrathful ocean’s deep, as if disdaining,
Spat it forth on India’s shores of light.
