Page:Potipharswifeoth00arnoiala.djvu/129

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.

THE FRIGATE ENDYMION

("Towards the close of the war with France, Captain the Hon. Sir Charles Paget, while cruising in the Endymion frigate on the coast of Spain, descried a French ship of the line in imminent danger, embayed among rocks on a lee shore: bowsprit and foremast gone, and riding by a stream cable: her only remaining one.

"Though it was blowing a gale, Sir Charles bore down to the assistance of his enemy, dropped his sheet-anchor on the Frenchman's bow, buoyed the cable, and veered it across his hawser. This the disabled ship succeeded in getting in, and thus seven hundred lives were saved from destruction.

"After performing this chivalrous action the Endymion, being herself in great peril, hauled to the wind, let go her bower-anchor, club-hauled, and stood off shore on the other tack." Vide "Catalogue Royal Naval Exhibition, 1891.")

The English roses on her face
Blossomed a brighter pink, for pride,
As, through the glories of the place
Wistful, we wandered, side by side.

We saw our bygone worthies stand,

Done to the life, in steel and gold,