In Black Servitude.

The big ships and the big business that buzzes about them are a tonic for any pessimist—they are restorers of confidence in man's immense power of achievement—and yet the walker on the waterfront is pleased that some of the little things are still here. A blue-jerseyed “salt of the old school” has just stepped ashore from a small schooner, and he has paused by a coal-hulk which clings like a dingy black beetle to the side of a large steamer. The ancient mariner knows that battered hulk. He remembers her as a trim aristocrat, daintily flounced, spreading bright wings to the winds of heaven, proudly working in and out of the ports of the seven seas. Poor, tarred remnants of ships! They are warped or tugged in dejection from one wharf to another, with never a wing to fling to the breeze, but between times they have a resting place out in the bay. One can think of their souls communing there o’ nights when the wind gives some of the old motion at the moorings, and moans through their rigging and whistles on the stumps of masts.

Sometimes the stark array of brave ships, reduced to menial service, has a dignity put upon it. This is when a kindly mist half-veils the worn hulks and broken spars, and suggests a battle fleet, hurt but triumphant, resting in the smoke of its victorious guns.