"The Old Canoe" (1855)
Song and Chorus
[Words? -- anonymous]
Composed by
[Music by]
J[oseph]. P[hilbrick]. Webster [1819-1875]

Chicago: Lyon & Healy, Cor. Clark & Washington Sts.
Boston: Oliver Ditson
New York: W. A. Pond & Co.
Milwaukee: Abel & Sherman
Cinn.: J. Church Jr.
Plate No. 16
[Source: am4134@UofWis-MillsMusicCollegeLibrary/AmericanaCollection]

1. Where the rocks are gray, and the shore is steep,
  And the waters below look dark and deep,
Where the rugged pine in its lonely pride,
  Leans gloomily over the murky tide;
Where the reeds and rushes are long and rank,
  And the weeds grow thick on the winding bank,
Where the shadow is heavy the whole day through,—
  There lies at its moorings the old canoe.

CHORUS [sung after each VERSE]
But I love to think of the hours that flew
  As I rocked where the whirls their life spray threw,
Ere the bright blossoms waved, or the green grass grew,
  O’er the mouldering stern of the old canoe.

2. The useless oars are idly dropped,
  Like a seabird’s wings that the storm has lopped,
And crossed on the railing one, o’er one,
  Like the folded hands when the work is done;
While busily back and forth between,
  The spider stretches his silvery screen,
And the solemn owl, with its dull “too... hoo,”
  Settles down on the side of the old canoe.

3. The stern half sunk in the slimy wave,
  Rots slowly away in its living grave,
And the green moss sweeps o’er its dull decay,
  Riding its mouldering dust away—
Like the hand that plants o’er the tomb a flow’r,
  Or the ivy that mantles the falling tower;
While many a blossom of lovliest hue,
  Springs up o’er the stern of the old canoe.

4. The currentless waters are dead and still;
  But the light wind plays with the boat at will,
And lazily in and out again
  It floats the length of the rusty chain,—
Like the weary march of the hands of time,
  That meet and part at the noontide chime;
And the shore is kissed at each turn anew,
  By the dripping bow of the old canoe.

5. O many a time, with a careless hand,
  I have pushed it away from the pebbly strand,
And paddled it down where the stream runs quick—
  Where the whirls are wild and the eddies are thick;
And laughed as I leaned o’er the rocking side,
  And looking below in the broken tide,
To see that the faces and boats were two
  That were mirrored back from the old canoe.

6. But now as I lean o’er the crumbling side,
  And look below in the sluggish tide,
The face that I see there is graver grown,
  And the laugh I hear has a soberer tone;
And the hand that lent to the light skift wings,
  Have grown familiar with sterner things—
All my youthful dreams of the rainbow’s hue,
  Are fading away in the old canoe.