Richmond Enquirer

THE WRECK

BY MRS. HEMANS.

All night the booming minute-gun
Had pealed along the deep,
And mournfully the rising sun
Look'd o'er the tide-worn steep.
A bark, from India's coral strand,
Before the rushing blast,
Had vail'd her topsails to the sand,
And bow'd her noble mast.
The queenly ship! brave hearts had striven,
And true ones died with her!
We saw her mighty cable riven,
Like floating gossamer!
We saw her proud flag struck that morn,
A star once o'er the seas,
Her helm beat down, her deck upturn'd,
And sadder things than these!
We saw her treasures cast away:
The rocks with pearls were sown;
And, strangely sad, the ruby's ray
Flash'd out o'er fretted stone;
And gold was strewn the wet sands o'er
Like ashes by a breeze,
And gorgeous robes,—but oh! that shore
Had sadder sights than these!
We saw the strong man, still and low,
A crushed reed thrown aside!
Yet, by that rigid lip and brow,
Not without strife he died!
And near him, on the sea-weed lay,
Till then we had not wept,
But well our gushing hearts might say
That there a mother slept;
For her pale arms a babe had pressed
With such a wreathing grasp,
In billows had dashed o'er that fond breast,
Yet not undone the clasp!
Her very tresses had been flung
To wrap the fair child-form,
Where still their wet, long streamers clung,
All tangled by the storm;
And beautiful, midst that wild scene,
Gleam'd up the boy's dead face,
Like Slumber's, trustingly serene,
In melancholy grace.
Deep in her bosom lay his head,
With half-shut violet eye;
He had known little of her dread,
Naught of her agony!
Oh, human love! whose yearning heart
Through all things vainly true,
Stamps upon thy immortal part
Its passionate adieu!
Surely thou hast another lot,
There is some hope for thee,
Where thou shalt recline, remembering not
The moaning of the sea!"

This circumstance is related of Mrs. Cargill, an actress of some celebrity, who was shipwrecked on the rocks of Scilly, when returning from India.