| |
| ’MID the light spray their snorting camels stood, | |
| Nor bathed a fetlock in the nauseous flood— | |
| He comes—their leader comes!—the man of God | |
| O’er the wide waters lifts His mighty rod. | |
| And onward treads—the circling waves retreat | 5 |
| In hoarse deep murmurs, from his holy feet; | |
| And the chased surges, inly roaring, show | |
| The hard wet sand and coral hills below. | |
| With limbs that falter, and with hearts that swell, | |
| Down, down they pass—a steep and slippery dell. | 10 |
| Around them rise, in pristine chaos hurled, | |
| The ancient rocks, the secrets of the world; | |
| The flowers that blush beneath the ocean green, | |
| And caves, the sea-calves’ low-roofed haunt, are seen. | |
| Down, safely down the narrow pass they tread; | 15 |
| The beetling waters storm above their head: | |
| While far behind retires the sinking day, | |
| And fades on Edom’s hills its latest ray. | |
| Yet not from Israel fled the friendly light, | |
| Or dark to them or cheerless came the night, | 20 |
| Still in their van, along the dreadful road, | |
| Blazed broad and fierce the brandished torch of God. | |
| Its meteor glare a tenfold lustre gave | |
| On the long mirror of the rosy wave: | |
| While its blest beams a sunlike heat supply, | 25 |
| Warm every cheek, and dance in every eye— | |
| To them alone—for Mizraim’s wizard train | |
| Invoke for light their monster gods in vain; | |
| Clouds heaped on clouds their struggling sight confine, | |
| And tenfold darkness broods above their line. | 30 |
| Yet on they fare, by reckless vengeance led, | |
| And range unconscious through the ocean’s bed. | |
| Till midway now—that strange and fiery form | |
| Showed his dread visage lightning through the storm; | |
| With withering splendor blasted all their might, | 35 |
| And brake their chariot wheels and marred their courser’s flight. | |
| “Fly, Mizraim, fly!”—From Edom’s coral strand | |
| Again the prophet stretched his dreadful wand:— | |
| With one wild crash the thundering waters sweep, | |
| And all is waves—a dark and lonely deep. | 40 |
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