Jersey.

("Jersey dort dans les flots.")     [Bk. III. xiv., Oct. 8, 1854.]     Dear Jersey! jewel jubilant and green,     'Midst surge that splits steel ships, but sings to thee!     Thou fav'rest Frenchmen, though from England seen,     Oft tearful to that mistress "North Countree";     Returned the third time safely here to be,     I bless my bold Gibraltar of the Free.     Yon lighthouse stands forth like a fervent friend,     One who our tempest buffets back with zest,     And with twin-steeple, eke our helmsman's end,     Forms arms that beckon us upon thy breast;     Rose-posied pillow, crystallized with spray,     Where pools pellucid mirror sunny ray.     A frigate fretting yonder smoothest sky,     Like pauseless petrel poising o'er a wreck,     Strikes bright athwart the dearly dazzled eye,     Until it lessens to scarce certain speck,     'Neath Venus, sparkling on the agate-sprinkled beach,     For fisher's sailing-signal, just and true,     Until Aurora frights her from the view.     In summer, steamer-smoke spreads as thy veil,     And mists in winter sudden screen thy sight,     When at thy feet the galley-breakers wail     And toss their tops high o'er the lofty flight     Of horrid storm-worn steps with shark-like bite,     That only ope to swallow up in spite.     L'ENVOY.     But penitent in calm, thou givest a balm,     To many a man who's felt thy rage,     And many a sea-bird - thanks be heard! -     Thou shieldest - sea-bird - exiled bard and sage.