o' the ward-room come,
The Chaplain among them, disciplined and
    dumb.
The blue-nosed boatswain, complexioned like
    slag,
Like a blue Monday lours—his implements in
    bag.
Executioners, his aids, a couple by him stand,
At a nod there the thongs to receive from his hand.
Never venturing a caveat whatever may betide,
Though functionally here on humanity's side,
The grave Surgeon shows, like the formal
    physician
Attending the rack o' the Spanish Inquisition.

The angel o' the "brig" brings his prisoner up;
Then, steadied by his old Santa-Clara, a sup,
Heading all erect, the ranged assizes there,
Lo, Captain Turret, and under starred
    bunting,
(A florid full face and fine silvered hair,)
Gigantic the yet greater giant confronting.

Now the culprit he liked, as a tall captain can
A Titan subordinate and true sailor-man;
And frequent he'd shown it—no worded
    advance,
But flattering the Finn with a well-timed glance.
But what of that now? In the martinet-mien
Read the Articles of War, heed the naval
    routine;
While, cut to the heart a dishonor there to win,
Restored to his senses, stood the Anak Finn;
In racked self-control the squeezed tears
    peeping,
Scalding the eye with repressed inkeeping.
Discipline must be; the scourge is deemed due.
But ah for the sickening and strange heart-
    benumbing,
Compassionate abasement in shipmates that view;
Such a grand champion shamed there succumbing!
"Brown, tie him up."—The cord he brooked:
How else?—his arms spread apart—never
    threaping;
No, never he flinched, never sideways he looked,
Peeled to the waistband, the marble flesh
    creeping,
Lashed by the sleet the officious winds urge.

In function his fellows their fellowship merge—
The twain standing nigh—the two boatswain's
    mates,
Sailors of his grade, ay, and brothers of his
    mess.
With sharp thongs adroop the junior one
    awaits
The word to uplift.
              "Untie him—so!
Submission is enough, Man, you may go."
Then, promenading aft, brushing fat Purser
    Smart,
"Flog? Never meant it—hadn't any heart.
Degrade that tall fellow? "—Such, wife, was he,
Old Captain Turret, who the brave wine could
    stow.
Magnanimous, you think?—But what does
    Dick see?
Apron to your eye! Why, never fell a blow;
Cheer up, old wifie, 't was a long time ago.

But where's that sore one, crabbed and-severe,
Lieutenant Lon Lumbago, an arch scrutineer?
Call the roll to-day, would he answer—Here!
When the Blixum's fellows to quarters
    mustered
How he'd lurch along the lane of gun-crews
    clustered,
Testy as touchwood, to pry and to peer.
Jerking his sword underneath larboard arm,
He ground his worn grinders to keep himself
    calm.
Composed in his nerves, from the fidgets set
    free,
Tell, Sweet Wrinkles, alive now is he,
In Paradise a parlor where the even
    tempers be?

Where's Commander All-a-Tanto?
Where's Orlop Bob singing up from below?
Where's Rhyming Ned? has he spun his last
    canto?
Where's Jewsharp Jim? Where's Ringadoon
    Joe?
Ah, for the music over and done,
The band all dismissed save the droned
    trombone!
Where's Glenn o' the gun-room, who loved
    Hot-Scotch—
Glen, prompt and cool in a perilous watch?
Where's flaxen-haired Phil? a gray lieutenant?
Or rubicund, flying a dignified pennant?

But where sleeps his brother?—the cruise it was
    o'er,
But ah, for death's grip that welcomed him
    ashore!
Where's Sid, the cadet, so frank in his brag,
Whose toast was audacious—"Here's Sid, and
    Sid's flag!"
Like holiday-craft that have sunk unknown,
May a lark of a lad go lonely down?
Who takes the census under the sea?
Can others like old ensigns be,
Bunting I hoisted to flutter at the gaff—
Rags in end that once were flags
Gallant streaming from the staff?

Such scurvy doom could the chances deal
To Top-Gallant Harry and Jack Genteel?
Lo, Genteel Jack in hurricane weather,
Shagged like a bear, like a red lion roaring;
But O, so fine in his chapeau and feather,
In port to the ladies never once jawing;
All bland politesse, how urbane was he—
"Oui, mademoiselle"—"Ma chère amie!"

'T was Jack got up the ball at Naples,
Gay in the old Ohio glorious;
His hair was curled by the berth-deck barber,
Never you'd deemed him a cub of rude Boreas;
In tight little pumps, with the grand dames in
    rout,
A-flinging his shapely foot all about;
His watch-chain with love's jeweled tokens
    abounding,
Curls ambrosial shaking out odors,
Waltzing along the batteries, astounding
The gunner glum and the grim-visaged loaders.

Wife, where be all these blades, I wonder,
Pennoned fine fellows, so strong, so gay?
Never their colors with a dip dived under;
Have they hauled them down in a lack-lustre
    day,
Or beached their boats in the Far, Far Away?
Hither and thither, blown wide asunder,
Where's this fleet, I wonder and wonder.
Slipt their cables, rattled their adieu,
(Whereaway pointing? to what rendezvous?)
Out of sight, out of mind, like the crack
    Constitution,
And many a keel time never shall renew—
Bon Homme Dick o' the buff Revolution,
The Black Cockade and the staunch True-Blue.

Doff hats to Decatur! But where is his blazon?
Must merited fame endure time's wrong—
Glory's ripe grape wizen up to a raisin?
Yes! for Nature teems, and the years are
    strong,
And who can keep the tally o' the names that
    fleet along!

But his frigate, wife, his bride? Would
    blacksmiths brown
Into smithereens smite the solid old renown?
Rivetting the bolts in the iron-clad's shell,
Hark to the hammers with a rat-tat-tat;
"Handier a derby than a laced cocked hat!
The Monitor was ugly, but she served us right
    well,
Better than the Cumberland, a beauty and the
    belle."

Better than the Cumberland!—Heart alive
    in me!
That battlemented hull, Tantallon o' the sea,
Kicked in, as at Boston the taxed chests o' tea!
Ay, spurned by the ram, once a tall, shapely
    craft,
But lopped by the Rebs to an iron-beaked
    raft—
A blacksmith's unicorn in armor cap-a-pie.

Under the water-line a ram's blow is dealt:
And foul fall the knuckles that strike below the
    belt.
Nor brave the inventions that serve to replace
The openness of valor while dismantling the
    grace.

Aloof from all this and the never-ending game,
Tantamount to teetering, plot and counterplot;
Impenetrable armor—all-perforating shot;
Aloof, bless God, ride the war-ships of old,
A grand fleet moored in the roadstead of fame;
Not