A SALT BREEZE 159 



But when the poet of the Sierras places old Nep- 

 tune on the anxious bench, in this wise, — 



" Behold the ocean on the beach 

 Kneel lowly down as if in prayer; 

 1 hear a moan as of despair, 

 While far at sea do toss and reach 

 Some things so like white pleading hands," 



one has serious qualms. 



The breakers usually suggest to the poets rearing 



and plunging steeds, as in Arnold: — 



" Now the wild white horses play, 

 Champ and chafe and toss in the spray," 



and Stedman's spirited poem, "Surf," makes use of 

 the same image. Byron, in "Childe Harold," lays 

 his hand upon the "mane " of the ocean. Whitman, 

 recalling the shapes and sounds of the shore by 

 moonlight, startles the imagination with this line : — 

 " The white arms out iu the breakers tirelessly tossing." 

 One of our poets — Taylor, I think — has applied 

 the epithet " chameleon " to the sea, — " the chame- \ 

 leon sea, " — which fits well, for the sea takes on i 

 all hues and tints. To the genial Autocrat the 

 sea is " feline " and treacherous, — something of 

 the crouching and leaping tiger in it. The poet of 

 "The New Day," as a foil to his love and admira- 

 tion for it, calls it "the accursed sea." There is 

 sea-salt in Whitman's poetry, strongly realistic epi- 

 thets and phrases, that had their birth upon the 

 shore, and that perpetually recur to one as he saun- 

 ters on the beach. He uses the word "rustling" 

 and the phrase "hoarse and sibilant" to describe 

 the sound of the waves. "The husky-voiced sea" 



