442 PEOSB HALIBUTICS. 



ing blast ; how the strained planks creak and start : how 

 the mast sways to and frOj and finally snaps and goes 

 overboard; and how the passive hulk moves no more 

 than if it lay in dock : 



The seamen run confused, no labour spared. 



Let fly tte sheets, and hoist the topmast yard ; 



The master bids them give her all the sails. 



To court the winds, and catch the coming gales : 



But though the canvas beUies with the blast, 



And boist'rous winds bend down the cracking mast, 



The bark stands firmly rooted on the sea. 



And all unmoved as tower or tow'ring tree.* 



PUny^ with equal confidence, relates the foUowuig of the 

 same fish : — 



The current of the sea is great, its tides mighty, the winds puis- 

 sant and forcible ; and more than that, ores and sailes withal to 

 help forward the rest are mighty and powerful, and yet there is 

 one little siUie fish, Eoheneis, that checketh, scorneth, and ar- 

 resteth them all ; let the winds blow as much as they wiU, rage 

 the storms and tempests never so strong, even yet this little fish 

 conxmandeth their fiiry, restraineth their puissance, and, maugre 

 all their force, as great as it is, compeUeth the ships to stand still ! 

 Why shoxdd our fleets and armadas at sea make such turrets on 

 the walls and forecastles, when one little fish — (see the vanitie of 

 man !) — is able to arrest and stay perforce our goodly and tall 

 ships? Certes, reported it is, that in the navaU battle before 

 Aotium, wherein Anthony and Cleopatra were defeated by Au- 

 gustus, one of these fishes staid the admiral ship, wheron M. 

 Anthony was ; at what time as he made all the hast and means he 

 could devise, with help of ores, to encourage his people from ship 

 to ship, and could not prevail, until he was forced to abandon the 

 the same admiraU and goe into another galley. Meanwhile the 

 armada of Augustus Csesar, seeing the disorder, charged with 

 greater violence, and soon invested the fleet of Anthony. Of late 

 days also, and within our remembrance, the like happened to 

 the roiaU ship of the Emperor Cains Caligula ; at what time as 

 he rowed back and made saile from Astura to Antium : and as 



0pp. trans, by J. Jones. 



