John Gay (1685–1732)

’TWAS when the seas were roaring

With hollow blasts of wind;

A damsel lay deploring,

All on a rock reclin’d.

Wide o’er the rolling billows

She cast a wistful look;

Her head was crowned with willows

That tremble o’er the brook.

Twelve months are gone and over,

And nine long tedious days:

Why didst thou, vent’rous lover,

Why didst thou trust the seas?

Cease, cease, thou cruel ocean,

And let my lover rest:

Ah! what’s thy troubled motion

To that within my breast?

The merchant, robbed of pleasure,

Sees tempests in despair;

But what’s the loss of treasure

To losing of my dear?

Should you some coast be laid on

Where gold and di’monds grow,

You’d find a richer maiden,

But none that loves you so.

How can they say that Nature

Has nothing made in vain?

Why then beneath the water

Should hideous rocks remain?

No eyes the rocks discover

That lurk beneath the deep,

To wreck the wand’ring lover,

And leave the maid to weep.

All melancholy lying,

Thus wailed she for her dear;

Repaid each blast with sighing,

Each billow with a tear;

When o’er the white wave stooping,

His floating corpse she spied;

Then, like a lily drooping,

She bow’d her head and died.