Dreaming thus, (Small wonder that my footsteps went astray!) I found myself within a narrow street, Alone. There was no rumour, near or far, Of the long tides of traffic. In my doubt I turned and knocked upon an old inn-door, Hard by, an ancient inn of mullioned panes, And crazy beams and over-hanging eaves: And, as I knocked, the slowly changing west Seemed to change all the world with it and leave Only that old inn steadfast and unchanged, A rock in the rich-coloured tides of time.
And, suddenly, as a song that wholly escapes Remembrance, at one note, wholly returns, There, as I knocked, memory returned to me. I knew it all--the little twisted street, The rough wet cobbles gleaming, far away, Like opals, where it ended on the sky; And, overhead, the darkly smiling face Of that old wizard inn; I knew by rote The smooth sun-bubbles in the worn green paint Upon the doors and shutters.
There was one Myself had idly scratched away one dawn, One mad May-dawn, three hundred years ago, When out of the woods we came with hawthorn boughs And found the doors locked, as they seemed to-night. Three hundred years ago--nay, Time was dead! No need to scan the sign-board any more Where that white-breasted siren of the sea Curled her moon-silvered tail among such rocks As never in the merriest seaman's tale Broke the blue-bliss of fabulous lagoons Beyond the Spanish Main.
And, through the dream, Even as I stood and listened, came a sound Of clashing wine-cups: then a deep-voiced song Made the old timbers of the Mermaid Inn Shake as a galleon shakes in a gale of wind When she rolls glorying through the Ocean-sea.
Marchaunt Adventurers, chanting at the windlass, Early in the morning, we slipped from Plymouth Sound, All for Adventure in the great New Regions, All for Eldorado and to sail the world around! Sing! the red of sun-rise ripples round the bows again. Marchaunt Adventurers, O sing, we're outward bound, All to stuff the sunset in our old black galleon, All to seek the merchandise that no man ever found.
_Chorus:_ Marchaunt Adventurers! Marchaunt Adventurers!
Marchaunt Adventurers, O, whither are ye bound?-- All for Eldorado and the great new Sky-line, All to seek the merchandise that no man ever found.