Classic Poem

The sea-caves boom on the eastern coast,
And the sea-caves sound on the west,
Where the phantom sails of the Dutchman's Ghost
Are bound for the port of Rest.
Three hundred years and a hundred years
Full sail for the Port of Rest.

The sea-caves sound by the Cape of Storms,
Where the sprays of the Two Seas fly;
And the Ghost of the Sea-Past fades and forms,
And the phantom ships go by —
The English ship and the square Dutch ship
And the tall-pooped Spaniard by.

There's the ghost of the great East Indiaman,
Bound Home from the China Sea,
By the Cape of Storms where the Portingales
Sailed to their spicerie.
( " By this wild Cape goe the Portingales
Untoe their spicerie. " )

The sea-caves sound by the Northern Strait
That Torres failed to find;
The sea-caves sound by the Southern gate
That Tasman left behind.
(His sweetheart's name was in his heart
And the New World on his mind.)

The grand old spirit in the South prevails,
The spirit of the Old Sea Days —
Of the Spaniard, Dutch and Portingales,
And it sails where the ghost of the Waratah sails,
And the sea-caves sing its praise.