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The eager islanders one by one Counted the shots of her signal gun, And heard the crash when she drove right on!

Is there, then, no death for a word once spoken?

Was never a deed but left its token
Written on tables never broken?

Do the elements subtle reflections give?
Do pictures of all the ages live
On Nature's infinite negative,

Which, half in sport, in malice half, She shows at times, with shudder or laugh,

Phantom and shadow in photograph?

For still, on many a moonless night, From Kingston Head and from Montauk light

The spectre kindles and burns in sight.

Now low and dim, now clear and higher, Leaps up the terrible Ghost of Fire, Then, slowly sinking, the flames expire.

And the wise Sound skippers, though skies be fine,

Reef their sails when they see the sign Of the blazing wreck of the Palatine!

Birds ceased to sing, and all the barnyard fowls

Roosted; the cattle at the pasture bars Lowed, and looked homeward; bats on leathern wings

Flitted abroad; the sounds of labor died;

Men prayed, and women wept; all ears grew sharp

To hear the doom-blast of the trumpet shatter

The black sky, that the dreadful face of Christ

Might look from the rent clouds, not as he looked

A loving guest at Bethany, but stern
As Justice and inexorable Law.

Meanwhile in the old State House, dim as ghosts,

Sat the lawgivers of Connecticut, Trembling beneath their legislative robes.

"It is the Lord's Great Day! Let us adjourn,"

Some said; and then, as if with one accord,

All eyes were turned to Abraham Davenport.

He rose, slow cleaving with his steady voice

The intolerable hush. "This well may be

The Day of Judgment which the world awaits:

But be it so or not, I only know My present duty, and my Lord's command

To occupy till he come. So at the

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With bays of marsh, and capes of bush and tree,

The wood's black shore-line loomed beyond the meadowy sea. "One song,

The lady rose to leave. Or hymn," they urged, "before we part.'

And she, with lips to which belong Sweet intuitions of all art,

Gave to the winds of night a strain Which they who heard would hear

again;

And to her voice the solemn ocean lent, Touching its harp of sand, a deep accompaniment.

The harp at Nature's advent strung
Has never ceased to play;
The song the stars of morning sung
Has never died away.

And prayer is made, and praise is given,
By all things near and far:
The ocean looketh up to heaven,
And mirrors every star.

Its waves are kneeling on the strand,
As kneels the human knee,
Their white locks bowing to the sand,
The priesthood of the sea!

They pour their glittering treasures forth,

Their gifts of pearl they bring,
And all the listening hills of earth
Take up the song they sing.

The green earth sends her incense up
From many a mountain shrine;
From folded leaf and dewy cup
She pours her sacred wine.

The mists above the morning rills
Rise white as wings of prayer;

The altar-curtains of the hills
Are sunset's purple air.

The winds with hymns of praise are loud,

Or low with sobs of pain. The thunder-organ of the cloud, The dropping tears of rain.