| |
| WHERE the remote Bermudas ride | |
| In the ocean’s bosom unespied, | |
| From a small boat that rowed along | |
| The listening winds received this song: | |
| “What should we do but sing His praise | 5 |
| That led us through the watery maze | |
| Where he the huge sea monsters wracks, | |
| That lift the deep upon their backs, | |
| Unto an isle so long unknown, | |
| And yet far kinder than our own? | 10 |
| He lands us on a grassy stage, | |
| Safe from the storms, and prelate’s rage; | |
| He gave us this eternal spring | |
| Which here enamels everything, | |
| And sends the fowls to us in care | 15 |
| On daily visits through the air. | |
| He hangs in shades the orange bright | |
| Like golden lamps in a green night. | |
| And does in the pomegranates close | |
| Jewels more rich than Ormus shows: | 20 |
| He makes the figs our mouths to meet, | |
| And throws the melons at our feet; | |
| But apples, plants of such a price, | |
| No tree could ever bear them twice. | |
| With cedars chosen by his hand | 25 |
| From Lebanon he stores the land; | |
| And makes the hollow seas that roar | |
| Proclaim the ambergris on shore. | |
| He cast (of which we rather boast) | |
| The Gospel’s pearl upon our coast; | 30 |
| And in these rocks for us did frame | |
| A temple where to sound his name. | |
| O, let our voice his praise exalt | |
| Till it arrive at heaven’s vault, | |
| Which then perhaps rebounding may | 35 |
| Echo beyond the Mexique bay!”— | |
| Thus sung they in the English boat | |
| A holy and a cheerful note; | |
| And all the way, to guide their chime, | |
| With falling oars they kept the time. | 40 |
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