Dawn, ever bearing some divine increase...

Dawn, ever bearing some divine increase

Of beauty, love, and wisdom round the world,

Dawn, like a wild-rose in the fields of heaven

Washed grey with dew, awoke, and found the barque

At anchor in a little land-locked bay.

A crisp breeze blew, and all the living sea

Beneath the flower-soft colours of the sky,

Now like a myriad-petalled rose and now

Innumerably scalloped into shells

Of rosy fire, with dwindling wrinkles edged

Fainter and fainter to the unruffled glow

And soft white pallor of the distant deep,

Shone with a mystic beauty for those twain

Who watched the gathering glory; and, in an hour,

Drake and sweet Bess, attended by a guard

Of four swart seamen, with bare cutlasses,

And by the faithful eyes of old Tom Moone,

Went up the rough rock-steps and twisted street

O’ the small white sparkling seaport, tow'rds the church

Where, hand in hand, before God's altar they,

With steadfast eyes, did plight eternal troth,

And so were wedded. Never a chime of bells

Had they: but as they passed from out the porch

Between the sleeping graves, a skylark soared

Above the world in an ecstasy of song,

And quivering heavenwards, lost himself in light.