Explore "The Good Craft "Snow Bird" (Sea Pieces)" by Herman Melville on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
Strenuous need that head-wind be / From purposed voyage that drives at last / The ship, sharp-braced and dogged still, / Beating up against the blast.
Brigs that figs for market gather, / Homeward-bound upon the stretch, / Encounter oft this uglier weather / Yet in end their port they fetch.
Mark yon craft from sunny Smyrna / Glazed with ice in Boston Bay; / Out they toss the fig-drums cheerly, / Livelier for the frosty ray.
What if sleet off-shore assailed her, / What though ice yet plate her yards; / In wintry port not less she renders / Summer's gift with warm regards!
And, look, the underwriters' man, / Timely, when the stevedore's done, / Puts on his _specs_ to pry and scan, / And sets her down-_A, No. 1._
Bravo, master! Bravo, brig!
For slanting snows out of the West / Never the _Snow-Bird_ cares one fig; / And foul winds steady her, though a pest.