Classic Poem

The bark, my friends, which you see here,
Will tell you that it had no peer;
And that no skiff that swam the main,
Could get before it, strain for strain,
Whether it flew with sail or oar.
And this it says, not Adria's shore
With all its bluster can deny,
Nor that Aegean company,
Nor glorious Rhodes, nor savage Thrace,
Nor Hellespont with either face,
Nor the tremendous Pontic bay,—
Where, till it took it's watery way,
It was a thing of sylvan locks,
And used, on the Cytorian rocks,
To hiss and talk, with windy hair.
And thou, Amastris, and thou, there,
Cytorus, with whose box it grew,
And this, it says, was known to you;
And that from its remotest birth,
ITheld the summit of your earth;
And in your waters bathed its oars;
And so by all the harmless shores,
Carried its master in its breast,
Whether the wind was east or west;
Or whether Jove, upon the sail,
Sent, steady and blithe, a forward gale.
Nor ever had it vows to pay
To gods that watch the billowy way,
When it came home from distant seas
And in this limpid lake took ease.
But this is past: and now, grown old,
It lays its age in this calm hold,
And dedicates itself to thee,
Castor, and thy twin deity.