One ship drives east and the other drives west
With the selfsame winds that blow.
'Tis the set of the sails and not the gales
Which tells us the way to go.
-- Ella Wheeler Wilcox, Winds of Fate
But who is this, what thing of sea or land,--
Female of sex it seem
That so bedeck'd, ornate, and gay,
Comes this way sailing
Like a stately ship
Of Tarsus, bound for th' isles
Of Javan or Gadire,
With all her bravery on, and tackle trim,
Sails fill'd, and streamers waving,
Courted by all the winds that hold them play,
An amber scent of odorous perfume
Her harbinger?...
I therefore send to His Majesty a chart drawn by my own hand upon
which is laid out the western coast from Ireland on the north to the
end of Guinea, and the islands which lie on that route, in front of
which directly to the west, is shown the beginning
of the Indies....
