The Forging of the Anchor, A Poem.

London: Cassell & Company, Limited, 1883. Square octavo, illus. blue cloth (hardcover), gilt letters and decorations, gilt edges, card-stock pages, [24] pp. Illustrated. Good+, with darkened spine and lightly soiled covers, heavy foxing (age darkened spotting) throughout. Come, see the Dolphin’s Anchor forg’d -- tis at a white heat now: The bellows ceased, the flames decreased -- though on the forge’s brow/The little flames still fitfully play through the sable mound/And fitfully you still may see the grim smiths ranking round, All clad in leathern panoply, their broad hands only bare; Some rest upon their sledges here, some work the windlass there. The windlass strainst the tackle chains, the black mound heaves below, And red and deep a hundred veins burst out at every throe: It rises, roars, rends all outright -- O Vulcan, what a glow! Tis blinding white, tis blasting bright -- the high sun shines not so! The high sun sees not, on the earth, such fiery fearful show; The roof-ribs swarth, the candent hearth, the ruddy lurid row/ Of smiths that stand, an ardent band, like men before the foe; As, quivering through his fleece of flame, the sailing monster slow/Sinks on the anvil -- all about, the faces fiery grow. Hurrah! they shout, leap out -- leap out; bang, bang, the sledges go; Hurrah! the jetting lightnings are hissing high and low -- a hailing fount of fire is struck at every squashing blow... (Inventory #: 005384scs)