1897:1 In a British Man-o'-War 



KOMANDORSKI 



Sail I o'er the icy sea 

 Where the twin Storm-Islands be, 

 In a British man-o'-war 

 (Cold and hard her bulwarks are) 

 Far to where the haughty North 

 Sends his eager minions forth 

 Tugging at the tawny manes 

 Of deep-sunken mountain chains, 

 Great ships greeting with a laugh, 

 Tossing them about like chaff; 

 Never they since tides began 

 Tamed to let or call of man. 



Komandorski, grim, defiant, 

 Stands before them like a giant, 

 Flinging to the Ocean Chiefs 

 The stern gauntlet of his reefs. 



Crest on crest redoubtable, 

 Prone at Tolstoi's feet they fall, 

 And their haughty hosts become 

 Impotent in angry foam; 

 While the sea-mists, cold and gray, 

 Whirl their shredded ghosts away 

 High to where the storm-clouds be, 

 The Valhalla of the Sea! 



And I watch them as I lie, 

 Tossing ever helplessly, 

 In the British man-o'-war 

 (Cold as steel her bulwarks are). 

 Through the porthole from the shore 

 Comes the deep, sonorous roar, 

 As on Bering's reefs the surges 

 Chant the great Commander's dirges. 



Then, within the sordid gloom 

 Of my little cabin-room 

 All at once a presence rare 



IT 593 



