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Music of the Waters. 207 |
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Then underneath our keel it went And glared with savage fury pent, And round about the ship it swum, Striking each man and woman dumb. Stay—one there was who found a tongue, And still retained her strength of lung— Fredessa, beauteous matron bold, Resolved to give that whale a scold ! But little cared that monster fish To gratify Fredessa's wish ; He shook his tail, that naughty whale, And flourished it like any flail, And ho ! for Vinland he made sail!"
Mr. Ballantyne further tells us that Biarne is not a poet of very high standing; at least, one may judge from the rhyming of the two lines following, that he knew how to avail himself of one of the many privileges poets have, viz. to take out his licence :—
" And round about the ship it swum, Striking each man and woman dumb ! "
In the same book, "The Norsemen in the West," we find another sea-song, which is set to a rattling tune :—
THE DANISH KINGS.
Solo.—" One night when one o' the Irish kings
Was sleeping in his bed, Six Danish kings—so Sigvat sings—
Came an' cut off his head. The Irish boys they heard the noise,
And flocked unto the shore ; They caught the kings, and put out their eyes,
And left them in their gore.
Chorus.—Oh! this is the way we served the kings
An' spoiled their pleasure—the dirty things— When they came to harry and flap their wings |
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