pirates
When the world was young!_

There was Captain Hook (of whom ye have heard--so called from his terrible
cold steel twister,
His own right hand having gone to a shark with a taste for skippers
on pirate-trips),
There was Silver himself, with his cruel crutch, and the blind man Pew,
with a phiz like a blister,
Gouged and white and dreadfully dried in the reek of a thousand
burning ships.

_While earth goes round, let rum go round,
Our capstan song we sung:
Half a hundred cut-throat pirates
When the world was young!_

With our silver buckles and French cocked hats and our skirted coats
(they were growing greener,
But green and gold look well when spliced! We'd trimmed 'em up
wi' some fine fresh lace)
Bravely over the seas we danced to the horn-pipe tune of a concertina,
Cutlasses jetting beneath our skirts and cambric handkerchiefs
all in place.

_While earth goes round, let rum go round,
Our capstan song we sung:
Half a hundred elegant pirates
When the world was young!_

And our black prow grated, one golden noon, on the happiest isle of
the Happy Islands,
An isle of Paradise, fair as a gem, on the sparkling breast of the
wine-dark deep,
An isle of blossom and yellow sand, and enchanted vines on the purple
highlands,
Wi' grapes like melons, nay clustering suns, a-sprawl over cliffs in
their noonday sleep.

_While earth goes round let rum go round,
Our capstan song we sung:
Half a hundred dream-struck pirates
When the world was young!_

And lo! on the soft warm edge of the sand, where the sea like wine
in a golden noggin
Creamed, and the rainbow-bubbles clung to his flame-red hair,
a white youth lay,
Sleeping; and now, as his drowsy grip relaxed, the cup that he
squeezed his grog in
Slipped from his hand and its purple dregs were mixed with the flames
and flakes of spray.

_While earth goes round, let rum go round,
Our capstan song we sung:
Half a hundred diffident pirates
When the world was young!_

And we suddenly saw (had we seen them before? They were coloured like
sand or the pelt on his shoulders)
His head