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| THE SHEETS were frozen hard, and they cut the naked hand; | |
| The decks were like a slide, where a seaman scarce could stand, | |
| The wind was a nor’-wester, blowing squally off the sea; | |
| And cliffs and spouting breakers were the only things a-lee. | |
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| They heard the surf a-roaring before the break of day; | 5 |
| But ’twas only with the peep of light we saw how ill we lay. | |
| We tumbled every hand on deck instanter, with a shout, | |
| And we gave her the maintops’l, and stood by to go about. | |
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| All day we tack’d and tack’d between the South Head and the North; | |
| All day we haul’d the frozen sheets, and got no further forth; | 10 |
| All day as cold as charity, in bitter pain and dread, | |
| For very life and nature we tack’d from head to head. | |
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| We gave the South a wider berth, for there the tide-race roar’d; | |
| But every tack we made we brought the North Head close aboard; | |
| So ’s we saw the cliffs and houses, and the breakers running high, | 15 |
| And the coastguard in his garden, with his glass against his eye. | |
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| The frost was on the village roofs as white as ocean foam; | |
| The good red fires were burning bright in every ’longshore home; | |
| The windows sparkled clear, and the chimneys volley’d out; | |
| And I vow we sniff’d the victuals as the vessel went about. | 20 |
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| The bells upon the church were rung with a mighty jovial cheer; | |
| For it ’s just that I should tell you how (of all days in the year) | |
| This day of our adversity was blessèd Christmas morn, | |
| And the house above the coastguard’s was the house where I was born. | |
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| O well I saw the pleasant room, the pleasant faces there, | 25 |
| My mother’s silver spectacles, my father’s silver hair; | |
| And well I saw the firelight, like a flight of homely elves | |
| Go dancing round the china-plates that stand upon the shelves! | |
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| And well I knew the talk they had, the talk that was of me, | |
| Of the shadow on the household and the son that went to sea; | 30 |
| And O the wicked fool I seem’d, in every kind of way, | |
| To be here and hauling frozen ropes on blessèd Christmas Day. | |
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| They lit the high sea-light, and the dark began to fall. | |
| ‘All hands to loose topgallant sails!’ I heard the captain call. | |
| ‘By the Lord, she’ll never stand it,’ our first mate Jackson cried. | 35 |
| … ‘It ’s the one way or the other, Mr. Jackson,’ he replied. | |
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| She stagger’d to her bearings, but the sails were new and good, | |
| And the ship smelt up to windward just as though she understood. | |
| As the winter’s day was ending, in the entry of the night, | |
| We clear’d the weary headland, and pass’d below the light. | 40 |
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| And they heaved a mighty breath, every soul on board but me, | |
| As they saw her nose again pointing handsome out to sea; | |
| But all that I could think of, in the darkness and the cold, | |
| Was just that I was leaving home and my folks were growing old. | |
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