31 OCTOBER 1931, Page 17

Tunny-Fish

(Concarneau Harbour)

BOAT after boat,

And more boats come,

Crowded closer than casks with bottles—

Grey torpedoes, Rigid tunny-fish.

Now they lie in square battalions, Ranked in hundreds, One grey uniform for hundreds : Hundreds, thousands, Dead in the barrack-square, drilled for inspection.

As if the Sea, Of whose wild humours Are hourly moulded Giants, graces, ghosts and goblins, Shapes more whimsical-fantastic

Than ever troubled the brain of Earth,—

As if the Sea, Inexhaustible deviser, Could only repeat, A dull mechanic, Its fancy failing, One single, grey, monotonous, moribund thought.-