wave, into the gray troughs of tumbling brine; there, as they can,
with slacked rope, and patched sail, and leaky hull, again to roll and
stagger far away amidst the wind and salt sleet, from dawn to dusk and
dusk to dawn, winning day by day their daily bread; and for last reward,
when their old hands, on some winter night, lose feeling along the
frozen ropes, and their old eyes miss mark of the lighthouse quenched in
foam, the so-long impossible Rest, that shall hunger no more, neither
thirst any more,--their eyes and mouths filled with the brown sea-sand.

After these most venerable, to my mind, of all ships, properly so
styled, I find nothing of comparable interest in any floating fabric
until we come to the great achievement of the 19th century. For one
thing this century will in after ages be considered to have done in a
superb manner, and one thing, I think, only. It has not distinguished
itself in political spheres; still less in artistical. It has produced
no golden age by its Reason; neither does it appear eminent for the
constancy of its Faith. Its telescopes and telegraphs would be
creditable to it, if it had not in their pursuit forgotten in great part
how to see clearly with its eyes, and to talk honestly with its tongue.
Its natural history might have been creditable to it also, if it could
have conquered its habit of considering natural history to be mainly the
art of writing Latin names on white tickets. But, as it is, none of
these things will be hereafter considered to have been got on with by us
as well as might be; whereas it will always be said of us, with unabated
reverence,

"THEY BUILT SHIPS OF THE LINE."

Take it all in all, a Ship of the Line is the most honorable thing that
man, as a gregarious animal, has ever produced. By himself, unhelped, he
can do better things than ships of the line; he can make poems and
pictures, and other such concentrations of what is best in him. But as a
being living in flocks, and hammering out, with alternate strokes and
mutual agreement, what is necessary for him in those flocks, to get or
produce, the ship of the line is his first work. Into that he has put as
much of his human patience, common sense, forethought, experimental
philosophy, self-control, habits of order and obedience, thoroughly
wrought handwork, defiance of brute elements, careless courage, careful
patriotism, and calm expectation of the judgment of God, as can well be
put into a space of 300