44 
THE SEA-SERPENT. 
one morning died away ; so tranquil and calm 
that summer ocean, you could half forget that the 
sea has motion. There we lay ; the sea seemed 
dead ; this quiet calm reminds me sadly of what 
the bold North-trader said, (he did not tell that 
story gladly.) Their ship was near, — so near, 
that we could in the silence faintly hear their 
songs of joyous revelry. They sung the lagging 
hours to cheer. O, who that ever sailed the sea, 
and has been becalmed for a week or day, has 
not felt a throb of sympathy for the stranger sail 
that near him lay ? 
“ ’T was noon. Our gallant frigate slept, and, 
save the sound of the light guitar, where the 
merry middies their revels kept, while one sung 
songs, sung better far by girls he’d met at New¬ 
port parties, (a simple song may tell you — 
ah, how truly ! — where that middy’s heart is,) 
naught broke the stillness of that hour, for a calm 
at sea has a soothing power. Some of us walked 
the quarter-deck, some in the cabin were writing, 
when, before a word or thought could check, 
