Chapter III

THE iron chariots bowling on
From Albany and Stonington,
Are chiming with their thousand wheels,
And within, the living cargo reels
And nods about familiarly,
Each to the other, as he were a brother,
And all as the mist falls silently.
Five hundred noses point ahead,
And a thousand eye-lids closed, as dead
As already the silver coin had pressed,
And sealed them in their final rest;
So chill, from the mist of the neighboring deep,
Is the nodding, nibbling, icy sleep;
And dreams confusing go and come,
Which blessings are and a curse to some;
But all with a feeling of 'Devil-may-care,'
Peculiar to the rail-road car,
Or such as you fancy a witch's are
On a broom-stick ride in the midnight air;
Some 'promenade all' at Symms's Hole,
Or, 'Hands all around' at the Northern Pole;
The spot, where the earth having come to a crisis
The Sun goes around on the tops of the ices,
A weary Anchises;
Ices, like Alps, of all shapes and devices;
The pyramid, dome, the temple, and all
That seemed 'frozen music' to Madame DE STAEL;
While cluster of stars, with their beautiful eyes,
Just peep in between, with a kind of surprise;
Some fading, some flashing, all grouping anew,
Like the lights of a city, when passing: in view,
Or laughing young girls, all crowding for places
In windows brim full of (God bless!) their sweet faces;
And thus night and day, vis-à-vis to each other,
Waltz round the horizon like sister and brother;
While deep in the vault, with a hand unseen,
(The 'unknown God' of the shifting scene.)
From the morning of Time, one star has stood
And ruled that glittering multitude.

Or, some may prefer, as it's here rather cold,
To mount on a streamer of crimson or gold,
And shooting off in a shaft of light,
Ride tangent up to the top o' the night,
And dip in the slant of the Sun, as he
Wheels up somewhere in the Indian sea;
Or wink to the wink of a new-made star,
Not yet rolled round, and 'caviare
To the general;' but here with a jar
That murders sleep, old Beelzebub,
With a kind of 'hip-hurrah!' hubbub,
A snort and a scream, has startled all;
And the lady in the travelling shawl
Has dropped her babe, too drugged to squall;
And stiff as a shaking Quaker sits
The gentleman in summer 'fits,'
No'th-East by East, a point too far;
His dream is true, that he left last night
New-York, at eighty of Fahrenheit--
And his coat in the baggage-car!

But dreams must change; and now they wake
To run on coffee and beef-steak;
The latest 'Picayune,' and then
A southern climate, to read it in;
A flower or two, a light and table,
To make the thing more passable;
A sea-coal fire, a Tremont-bath--
All the dear _comforts_ Boston hath
In such rich store; and _her's_ so much,
No other rail-road leads to such:
But some, with stubborn memories
Of last night's ugly-sounding seas,
The few, with stomachs out of tone,
Dream every thing; but, senses gone,
Have no distinct conception what,
Save a fire, and a bed, and something hot,
In (oh, so like a home to one!)
The pleasant rooms at the Albion.