"A BALLAD OF TRIPOLI TOWN."

OVER the reach of the harbor mouth the Philadelphia lay

To keep her watch on the pirate sea and muzzle the pirate Bey,

"And swift must be that Moorish bark that out of the north comes down

And carries her load of Christian slaves to the mart at Tripoli town."

Out in the offing day by day her watchful way she kept,
And ever the lookout's careful glass the fair horizon swept,
Dreary the game and dull the watch as lazily on she swayed,
With never the sound of an angry gun to lighten the lone brigade.

"A sail! A sail! was the lookout's cry, and close to the southern shore

A dark-hulled xeboc hugged her way and up for the harbor bore, Then shrilled the notes of the boatswain's pipe, the men to their quar

ters flew,

And the frigate reeled to the sudden strain as her quivering stunsails drew.

The green sea whitened beneath her bows and lifted in cloudy spray And her tall masts bent to the press of sail as she gained on the flying

prey,

But over a chartless way she sailed, and a hush fell over all,

At the sudden hail from the masthead high and the leadsman's frightened call.

Over the reef of Kalinsa the treacherous seas are green,

With never a hint of the rising shoals or the rocks that lie between; And there with a crash the good ship struck, and deep in the sands she lay,

And her rigging strained and her timbers groaned as she stopped in her sudden way.

In vain were her masts felled one by one, in vain were the weights run aft,

She lay in the clutch of the clinging sands in spite of the sailors' craft.

Then out of the harbor crowding sail the Barbary gunboats came And lay at the heels of the helpless ship in a crescent of smoke and flame.

With never a gun to make reply, the raking fire she bore,

And her decks grew rougher with splintered wreck and redder with flowing gore,

Till the starry ensign fluttered down at the beck of the pirate horde, And the captive crew were led away to the throne of the pirate lord.

Then loud the pirate's shrilling yell exulted on the air,

With the sounding drum and the cymbals clash and the long horn's windy blare;

And up to the town they towed the ship on the lift of a rising tide, And moored her fast in the channelway swept o'er by her black broad

side.

The pirate Bey laughed deep and long; "And where is he will dare
To pass the reef at the harbor mouth and enter the pirate lair?"
On yonder bay my gunboats glide, my forts look grimly down
And the guns of a Yankee frigate guard the way to Tripoli town."

Was ever a sea by ever a shore where perilous chances are
That has not sung to a Yankee keel or pillowed a Yankee tar?
Was ever a way so danger deep that way he dare not go?
From shore to shore with a deep sea roar old Ocean answers “No.”

Up to the roads of Tripoli town a little squadron drew,
And every ship at the mizzen peak a starry ensign flew.
Down to the harbor mouth they stood and close to the reef they ran,
And the Constitution's stately shape sailed grandly in the van.

"Oh, shame to every Yankee tar the billowy deep who plies,
For over a captured Yankee ship a pirate ensign flies,
And shall she carry a pirate crew to harry a pirate prey?
Who comes to sink her where she lies? Decatur leads the way."

We knew the voice and we knew the man, and a rousing sailor cheer Rang deeply over the tumbling sea as we sprang to volunteer;

For he was a hero truck to keel, and a sailor born and bred,

And through the gate of an angry fate we'd follow where he led.

We fitted a captured pirate ketch for the deed we had to do,
And all day long from stem to stern the carpenters beat tattoo.
They gave her a slovenly merchant look and smeared her with mer-
chant muck,

But her hold was stowed with a deadly load and filled for a deadly work.

Though all were willing but few could go, and many were left behind,
But a gibe or jeer for a luckier ear will soothe a troubled mind,
And when away from the great ship's side the little ketch moved slow,
Our shipmates hung on the rail and sung, as they watched us go:

"Oh, say good-bye to your Nancy Jane, and look your last on me, And what'll you say as you're led away in a swaggering pirate's lee, And what'll you think as you douse your glim, and where'll you're funeral be,

Under the nigger driver's whip or under the deep blue sea?"

We watched the ships as they gave the breeze their spreading wings

of snow;

We watched their sails in the sunset pink, their hulls in the distance low,

And over the darkening western hills we saw the sun go down,
And the daylight fail as our lonely sail sped on to Tripoli town.

A ghostly shape in the gathered dusk, to the perilous way we passed To the sound of the rigging's mourful hum and the groan of the straining mast,

To the haunting voice of the rising wind and the lilt of the rising

tide;

And the low waves sung with a mocking tongue, as they lapped along

the side:

"Oh, say good-bye to your Nancy Jane, and look your last on me, And what'll you say as you're led away in a swaggering pirate's lee, And what'll you think as you douse your glim, and where'll your funeral be,

Under the nigger driver's whip or under the deep blue sea?"

Starboard and larboard dark and dim the gunboats watched the way,
And dead ahead with a staylight red the towering frigate rose,
And the forts behind with their ramparts lined with twenty thousand
foes.

Up to the shadowy ship we drew in the cloak of the friendly night, And we lashed the ketch to her swelling side, and grappled her fast

and tight.

To a single shout and a single shot and a single frightened hail,
With sword in hand our silent band sprang over the lofty rail.

From deck and hold at the cutlass's point we scattered the craven

crew,

From deck to deck and from hold to hold with the blazing torch we

flew ;

We spread the powder, pitch and tar, and scattered the embers free, And loosed the grapples and cut the lines, and stood for the open

sea.

A puff of smoke in a rolling cloud along the water swept,

A tongue of flame from an open hatch to the hurrying breezes leapt, And then like sinuous snakes of flame the rigging burned on high, And wrapped the mast in a fiery blast, and reached for the reddening sky.

Redder and redder rose the flame, till over the glowing bay,
Bright as the glare of the noonday sun, a crimson radiance lay;
We saw the gunboats limned in fire, the fortress dull and brown,
And through the blaze in a golden haze the towers of Tripoli town.

And the little ketch stood boldly on, in the growing light displayed, Though fort and castle and gunboat roared in furious cannonade. And through the terrible lines of fire, unharmed, untouched, we went, For the scared corsair in the empty air his harmless thunders spent.

We reached the offing, we shortened sail, and safe in the distance lay, Till a roar like the roar of a thousand guns rang over the pirate bay, Till the light was quenched in the hissing wave, and the black night settled down

On the fortress grim and the gunboat dim and the towers of Tripoli

town.

The blue bay curves by Tripoli town where the minarets point high From the glaring waste of the yellow hills to the blue of the glaring

sky,

And the white sails skim by Tripoli town and over the bay they go, But the pride of the old time Yankee fleet lies fathoms deep below.

ROWAN STEVENS.