The Stone Fleet.

I have a feeling for those ships,

Each worn and ancient one,

With great bluff bows, and broad in the beam;

Ay, it was unkindly done.

But so they serve the Obsolete —

Even so, Stone Fleet!

You'll say I'm doting; do but think

I scudded round the Horn in one —

The Tenedos, a glorious

Good old craft as ever run —

Sunk ( how all unmeet! )

With the Old Stone Fleet.

An India ship of fame was she,

Spices and shawls and fans she bore;

A whaler when her wrinkles came —

Turned off! till, spent and poor,

Her bones were sold ( escheat )!

Ah! Stone Fleet.

Four were erst patrician keels

( Names attest what families be ),

The Kensington, and Richmond too,

Leonidas, and Lee:

But now they have their seat

With the Old Stone Fleet.

To scuttle them — a pirate deed —

Sack them, and dismast;

They sunk so slow, they died so hard,

But gurgling dropped at last.

Their ghosts in gales repeat

Woe's us, Stone Fleet!

And all for naught. The waters pass —

Currents will have their way;

Nature is nobody's ally;‘ tis well;

The harbor is bettered — will stay.

A failure, and complete,

Was your Old Stone Fleet.