The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1898-12-06
THR WRECK OF TIE PORTLAND.
tBy Frank H. colley.)

THE W hECk OE HIN FOIoAiA-ND'
(By Frank r. Colley.)
With wood and iron the builders sought
To shape from the masters plan,
AS staunch ship as might be wrought
BY the cunning hand of man;
They made her strong in every part,
AS ship of her kind might be,
A triumph of the builders art
Then gave her to the sea.
Then the master thought with honest
pride,
My task has been well done,
This ship upon the seas shall ride
Alike in storm and sun;
No wind can blow or wave can wreck
This child of my heart and lin,
And they who stand upon her deck
May laugh at the raging main.
But the hand Of man is a feeble hand
And the brain of man seems small,
When the earthquakes forces shake the
land
And the kings torrents fall;
For the builders art is little art
And toy is the builders plan.
When nature rends his work apart
What feeble thing is man.
Out from her port at close of day
A stately steamer rides,
Steadily threading her onward way
Over the silent tides;
Harbor lights CLEAN. the fort Ia passed
And the city lost to sight
On down the bay toward che ocean vast
She steers into the night.
Out where the rocks Of Marblehead,
Tower above the sea,
Passing old Gloucester, on she sped
Swiftly and silently;
On to where Thatcher's twinlights throw
Their beacons DER the main.
Onward she rushed in the binding snow
10 meet the hurricane.
What were the thoughts in that captains
mind
AS the ship like feather tossedS
How many prayers did the shrieking wind
Bear upward from the lost?
Man and woman, mother and child,
The cid and the young were there;
And out of the depths of that stormy wild
There rose common prayer.
Seven score souls on board she bore,
This creature of wood and steel,
Seven SCORE souls and how mauy more
The future may meier reveal:
For the sea holds the secret within her
breast,
And whispers it to the stars.
The tale of those who went down to rest,
Outside the Peaked Hill Bars.
Oh, God OF the storm and God of the sea,
Who marketh the sparrow's fall,
Comfort those who increasingly
| For loved ones yainly call;
Speak to the hearts of those who weep
And bid their SORROWS cease,
Over them.Thy watohguard keep
And I'LL them with Thy peace.
We know not why Thou hast taken
The friends we loved SO we'll,
And our faith il often shaken
BY grief no tongue can tell;
For thy ways are ways Of mystery,
And we vainly strive to see
Why the best of earth are first to die,
And we cry How can it be9''
Still the wild winds blow on Nauset's
shore
And the storm clouds fly o'erhead,
AS shoreward tossed with sullen roar
The sea gives up her dead;
A a Tai
Are scattered the hopes of years,
Laid low by the Reaper as He swept
His harvest of death and tears.
Oh, We whose ships go down to the sea,
When the waves are hushed in sleep,
Trust not her sham tran guilty,
But watchful vigil keep;
For the sea is a terrible, treacherous
thing,
And eager for its prey.
It lures to death with It's murmuring,
And lyeth in wait to Stay.
Oh, fisher wives of Marblehead,
Whose eyes are dim today,
Oh, Gloucester women who mourn your
dead
On the sands of that dreadful bay;
From out our grief we feebly cry,
God help us all this day.
And Desring's woods send back reply,
God help us all this day.
ONE OF THE BARGES FOUND.
One of tho barges lost by the Quebec
steamer Katahdin was picked up by the