by William Brighty Rands (1823 - 1882)
The ship that sailed into the sun
Language: English
They said my brother's ship went down,
Down into the sea,
Because a storm came on to drown
The biggest ships that be;
But I saw the ship, when he went away;
I saw it pass, and pass;
The tide was low, I went out to play,
The sea was all like glass;
The ship sailed straight into the sun,
Half of a ball of gold —
Onward it went till it touched the sun —
I saw the ship take hold!
But soon I saw them both no more,
The sun and the ship together,
For the wind began to hoot and to roar,
And there was stormy weather.
Yet every day the golden ball
Rests on the edge of the sky;
The sun it is, with the ship and all,
For the ship sailed into the golden ball
Across the edge of the sky.
Confirmed with Lilliput Levee, London: Alexander Strahan, 1864, pages 83-84. Also confirmed with Lilliput Levee: Poems of Childhood, Child-Fancy, and Child-Like Moods, London: Alexander Strahan, 1867, pages 81-82. The author's name does not appear anywhere in either publication.
Text Authorship:
- by William Brighty Rands (1823 - 1882), "The ship that sailed into the sun", appears in Lilliput Levee, London, Alexander Strahan, first published 1864 [author's text checked 2 times against a primary source]
Musical settings (art songs, Lieder, mélodies, (etc.), choral pieces, and other vocal works set to this text), listed by composer (not necessarily exhaustive):
- by Liza Lehmann (1862 - 1918), "The ship that sailed into the sun", published c1900 [ contralto, piano ], from The daisy chain: twelve songs of childhood, no. 7 [sung text checked 1 time]
Research team for this page: Emily Ezust [Administrator] , Poom Andrew Pipatjarasgit [Guest Editor]
This text was added to the website: 2008-07-08
Line count: 21
Word count: 146