In a far retreat / there lies a haven; towards the deep doth stand / an island, on whose jutting headlands beat / the broken billows, shivered into sleet.

East, West and squally South-west, with a roar, / swoop down on Ocean, and the surf and sand / mix in dark eddies, and the watery floor / heave from its depths, and roll huge billows to the shore. / Then come the creak of cables and the cries / of seamen.

We furl the sails, and shoreward row amain. / Eastward the harbour arches, scarce descried. / Two jutting rocks, by billows lashed in vain, / stretch out their arms the narrow mouth to hide. / Far back the temple stands, and seems to shun the tide.

The priest's cassock billowed gently in the wind.

Here Scylla, leftward sits Charybdis fell, / who, yawning thrice, her lowest depths laid bare, / sucks the vast billows in her throat's dark hell, / then starward spouts the refluent surge in air."

Thither we sailed, when, rising with the wave, / Orion dashed us on the shoals, the prey / of wanton winds, and mastering billows drave / our vessels on the pathless rocks astray. / We few have floated to your shore."

I was kept awake by the sound of the tent as it billowed in the breeze.

Beware... / Yet first 'twere best these billows to allay. / Far other coin hereafter ye shall pay / for crimes like these."

Far off is seen, above the billowy mere, / Trinacrian AEtna, and the distant roar / of ocean and the beaten rocks we hear, / and the loud burst of breakers on the shore; / high from the shallows leap the surges hoar, / and surf and sand mix eddying.

The shattered oars start forth; / round swings the prow, and lets the waters sweep / the broadside. Onward comes a mountain heap / of billows, gaunt, abrupt.