Chorus— Hail to the bark ! the Rover's bonny bark,
Which comes from the far south sea ;
She unfolds to the gale her broad white sail,
And wins her the victory.

She has mounted the ridge of the troubled wave,
She has played with his hostile foam,
Like a dolphin arous'd from his ocean cave.
Where the storm beaten Peterels roam.
O fond hearts bled when her sail was spread,
And the manly were stricken with fear ;
For she went to the isle of the shadowy dead.
And death is sole monarch there.
Hail to the bark, &c.

The anchor arose with a solemn moan,
'Twas his last farewell to the shore,
And the outward-bound felt dark and alone,
For their homes they might see them no more.
A sea-boy fell on his mother's breast,
Though he was a sea-boy brave.
As the eaglet might turn to his parent's nest,
When he first hears the temptest rave.
Hail to the bark, &c.

They had whisper'd tales of the spectre isles,
Those shadowy lands of fear—
He turn'd his young face to its Jirst resting place,
To shed there a sacred tear.
But who shall describe what the mother felt,
As she thought of the distant dead—
And as blessing her child, on the wet deck she knelt.
And gave him to danger and dread.
Hail to the bark, &c.

Now there stands at the helm a stalwart tar.
And their guide is the force of his arm—
He has battled with whirlwinds and dangers afar,
And sniil'd in the midst of alarm.
But the mother has clung to the breast of her boy,
And the hero again has grown weak;
For the manly are weeping to witness their joy.
And they shout with a tear on their cheek.
Hail to the bark, &c.