A POETICALL SEA-PEICE: Containing in a spacious table the lively description of a Tempest at Sea, and Shipvvrecks. Transcribed hither out of an elderly manuscript poem; partly for a lesson of life, and partly for the honorable uses which follow; under the old Greeke, and Roman solemn praefaces of good speed.
[...].
Quod faustum, foelix
(que) sit.
With the fauorable allowance, and concurrence (or not otherwise) of the aequall patrons, and friends of eminent Poets, and Painters, from CAESAR to the private Gentleman, and of those Poets, and eminent Painters themselves.
An Agonicall CHALLENGE, in the name of Apollo, to the Art of Apelles, bringing into a comparison the worke of wit, and words, by the penne, under the poeticall figure, Jcon, with the worke of wit, and colours, by the penicill.
Ob artium majus bonum.
The meritorious office of bringing the magnificent designe into act, by the meanes of Royall favour, is zealously recommended to the wisedome, and noble forwardnesse of M r. Endymion Porter, an affectionate, and an understanding lover; as of all other generous Arts, so specially of these the two most famous.
Printed at LONDON by Thomas Cotes. 1633.
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A POETICALL SEA-PEICE:
SO spake the stormy fiend; whose work it was,
To vex the aer, and seas as smoothe as glasse,
To roll on heaps till they on end doe stand,
Where they against the windes doe breaking band,
And lift at heaven, and in their rangeing race,
Twixt ridg and ridg the deep engulphing space,
Appeares like jawes infernall, mouthes of hell,
To swallow whole Fleets whole, none left to tell,
The losses hapning in those liquid graves.
Thus while the windes doe tyrannise the waves,
Great clapps of thunder break from thickned skie,
And shafts of lightning through the region flie,
And flie at randon, which more terrour breed:
They onely happy who were strucken dead.
The wilde seas madded thus, in their affray,
Doe threaten with their dash to put out day.
The rocks in sight would faine have shrunck the head,
The hidden to be seene in vaine doe dread.
The battred shores had almost yeelded back,
The waves so litle of their wils did lack:
And but for bounds the worlds creatour fixt,
All th' elements had once again been mixt.
The Mariner, when first the storm began,
By known signes taught to feare, looks pale and wan,
His sailes takes in, and stoups unto that ill,
He cannot master, and with sighes doth fill,
The deafe, and angry heavens, from whose offense,
The persecution came, permitted thence.
For otherwise an host of spirits want powr,
To stirre a breath, or strain a slender showr.
The sprinkling of the breaking waves beget,
Somewhat like rain, and which as much doth wet.
Yet fell rain also in so vast a store,
As had the windes slept, and the waves no more,
Been stirring then the windes, and force did use,
Which might, the ship it sunck not, bulge, and bruise:
Like chorus between acts so came the rain,
Peal after peal, then tragick storms again.
Away goes steerage, and the lead away,
All courses fail, no road is near, nor bay.
Away the card, away the compasse goes:
In two and thirty points not one point showes,
A line of safety, all the lines that were,
Did point to death, none other center there.
And if AMALFI had at that time found,
The loadstones use, the needle turning round,
Vpon no corner could have faln so true,
As to direct from whence lesse danger grew.
The staff wherewith the height they wont to take,
Now when each sea over the ship doth rake,
Surges whelm surges, billowes doe billowes ride,
(The sea-race running counter to the tide)
Vnusefull is, nor fit a step to stay,
When rocking ships the reeling drunkards play,
And disengorge the seas surcharging waste,
At gushing scuppet-holes, which seem to caste.
The dancing beak-head now doth plunge, and dive,
Then up again before the winde doth drive,
And while upright it stands upon the slide,
The naked bottom may be halfway eyd.
No place for art is left, no place for might,
And every way best pleaseth but the right.
For they the windes must follow not their will.
Obedience was their best, and that was ill.
To minde then first life past hath swift recourse,
Then first the feare of death doth stir remorse,
Awakens memory, represents things done:
And they who labourd riches to have wonne,
By deaths contempt, would all the world now give,
To be but safe on shore, and so to live.
These were the sports of that outragious fiend:
On whom a rabble of his likes attend,
Alike perdues, alike forlorn as he,
But lesse in power, in malice, and degree.
Some ball up clouds to ramme into the winde,
Others new blasts doe labour to unbinde,
And on their backs come feircely riding in,
Before the old ones to surcease begin,
And with their onsets violate the skie,
And betweene whiles doe whole broad-sides let flie.
The Vultures, Harpyes, and all birds of praey,
Took sanctuarie far upon shore away:
Their element is now no longer theirs.
Another shole of ouglier birds appeares,
Which visiblie possesse the troubled clime,
Themselves the sorest tempests of the time.
He had a coat full threefold thicke of brasse,
About his brest, nor for his life did passe,
Who first did dare to trust the sea with ship,
And keels did teach' on billowes backe to skip,
Who first to weather did commit his weal;
Or had strange cause from tyrants power to steal:
As had that man of CRETE, from whose arts fame,
Choice peices carry the DAEDALEAN name.
The ships sides crack, the tackle teres like thred:
Some plie the pump; some cry we all are dead.
Here climbes a nimble boy unto the top,
When him now halfway, or not halfway up,
A gust praevents, which ducks into the deep,
The shrowds themselves, & from the ropes doth sweep
The ventrous climer, darting him as farre,
As globe of stone from instrument of warre.
There, to stand fast the one the other bindes,
And both are blown of with the hoisting windes:
Another on his hands and feete doth creep;
Him bounding haches bandie to the deep.
Some trust unto the halliards, and their hold,
The cordage flies, they under seas are rolld.
The giddy ship the sailers braines turnes round,
And strains him so, though hard his browes be bound,
That, as from stricken flints, sparkes seeme to flie,
Throughout his bones, and out at either eie.
If any one lesse sicklie were then so,
Of life lesse weary he, the more his woe.
The Muse while this she sings is giddie grown;
And the right reader scarcely keeps his own.
No marvaile then if their braines turned were,
Who of the storm the stresse entire did beare.
The rudder torne away begins the wrack,
Though of the same the lesser was the lack,
For that long since it ceast of use to bee,
And traiterous leaks drunk in the driving sea.
No standing on the decks, no stirring there;
Th' unbridled beast will now no master heare,
But flings the rider, off the sailer shakes;
And each a grave-roome of his cabin makes.
The noise so hvge as shricks of men were drownd;
No anchorage but in vowes; nor in them found.
Not so much saile aloft left hanging there,
As would suffice to wipe away one teare.
The masts cut down, the goods throwne over borde,
And last themselves; all aid's in vaine implorde,
All hands in vain employd, the hull to save,
When gaping comes the fatall finall wave,
Cal'd
Decumane, which into watrie woomb,
At one suck drawes down all, but gives no toomb;
For what one sea devours another drives,
Rebelching it in mockage of their lives;
And as a load too heavie to digest,
These surges play it over to the rest,
And while one wreck another wreck doth hit,
What seas left whole is so in peices split;
Or cast on beds of sand, or ragged rocks,
The carcasse-selfe dissolving with the shocks.
The planks start out, the ribbs in peices crack,
No timber is so strong, but yeeldeth back,
And as the waves rush in, forth shoots the ware,
Such as remaind t'accompany dispaire.
With them the deeps are spred, here barrels flote,
There packs not yet through-wet, and chests of note,
And men and boyes ride on them while they may,
Then shrick out last farewels and fall away:
The wine with brine doth mix; and mingled so,
The curled fome doth no pure whitenesse show,
But dipt in claret die praetends to blush.
One swallowing surge the Merchants hop's doth crush,
The Factors, Sailers, Childrens, Wives, and Friends:
In wretched losse the whole adventure ends.
And though the Ocean opens to the sky,
Where none alive is neere to bid, or buy,
A world of scattred goods on billowes green,
As at a mart, yet they in vain are seene,
And what his mercy spares, or what the kinde,
Of that which cannot sinck the shore doth finde,
The shore more cruell then the sea devours;
For he who claimes the wreck cries, all is ours.
Nor with lesse noise then as if from the side,
Of steple rocks a cliff should chance to slide,
And drop into the under-beating seas,
To the great fright of the NEREIDES,
And other wanton nymphs who play by shore,
The sunck ship fals, and beaten waters rore.
The ravenous fish, (those wolves of NEPTVNES fie
[...]
A passage short to quick and dead doe yeild,
Through greedy mawes; but corpses thrown on shore▪
Finde buriall there, and people to deplore.
The cowerd under hatches feeles the fall,
Not daring sight to use, nor speech at all,
And stops his eares, just as his breath is stopt.
But the tall fellow never overtopt,
With basenesse though with brine, in swimming sinks,
And even in sinking of surviving thinks,
Bestrides some maste, layes hold of yard, or planck,
And though among the lost himselfe he ranck,
Yet strives with armes, and leggs to keepe aloft.
And boldnesse so is blest, that not unoft,
God favours his escape, and lets him goe.
"The valiant man against despaire cries No.
"And though of all things else bereft, and left,
"Himselfe he leaves not. God no greater gift▪
"Hath given unto man than such a minde,
"Beneath the which are fortune, seas, and winde,
"Above it nothing else but God alone,
"And to him knit is alwayes so his owne.
FINIS.
Sit Trinitati sempiterna gloria.