The Ballad of the Oysterman

By Oliver Wendell Holmes

“The Ballad of the Oysterman” is Oliver Wendell Holmes’s 1830 comic ballad about a young oysterman who swims a river to court a fisherman’s daughter, only to drown when her father reaches for his harpoon. The 28-line poem parodies tragic love ballads and ends with the lovers keeping “an oyster-shop for mermaids down below.”

Our reading is that the poem is a skillful joke on sentimental poetry. It keeps every convention of the tragic ballad, the moonlit meeting, the angry father, the drowned lover, and deflates each one with a homely detail, so that the story’s sad ending lands as its punch line.

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Summary · The Poem · Background · Analysis and Themes · Form and Technique · Notable Lines · Themes · FAQ
Glossary · Related Poems

Summary

A tall young oysterman lives on one bank of a river, and a fisherman’s slim daughter lives on the other. One moonlit evening, she waves her handkerchief at him, signaling that her family is out. Remembering the story of Leander, who swam the Hellespont to see his love, he decides to swim across rather than take his boat, so no one will see.

There are kisses on the bank until her father’s step sends the oysterman back into the water. The daughter tells her father the splash was a pebble and the swimmer a porpoise, but he calls for his harpoon. She faints, the oysterman gets a cramp and drowns, and Fate, taking pity on them, turns them into keepers of an oyster shop for mermaids at the bottom of the river.

The Poem

The text below follows The Complete Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes (Houghton Mifflin, 1895), where Holmes printed it among his earliest verses.

It was a tall young oysterman lived by the river-side,
His shop was just upon the bank, his boat was on the tide;
The daughter of a fisherman, that was so straight and slim,
Lived over on the other bank, right opposite to him.

It was the pensive oysterman that saw a lovely maid,
Upon a moonlight evening, a-sitting in the shade;
He saw her wave her handkerchief, as much as if to say,
“I’m wide awake, young oysterman, and all the folks away.”

Then up arose the oysterman, and to himself said he,
“I guess I’ll leave the skiff at home, for fear that folks should see;
I read it in the story-book, that, for to kiss his dear,
Leander swam the Hellespont,—and I will swim this here.”

And he has leaped into the waves, and crossed the shining stream,
And he has clambered up the bank, all in the moonlight gleam;
Oh there were kisses sweet as dew, and words as soft as rain,—
But they have heard her father’s step, and in he leaps again!

Out spoke the ancient fisherman,—“Oh, what was that, my daughter?”
“’T was nothing but a pebble, sir, I threw into the water.”
“And what is that, pray tell me, love, that paddles off so fast?”
“It’s nothing but a porpoise, sir, that’s been a-swimming past.”

Out spoke the ancient fisherman,—“Now bring me my harpoon!
I’ll get into my fishing-boat, and fix the fellow soon.”
Down fell that pretty innocent, as falls a snow-white lamb,
Her hair drooped round her pallid cheeks, like seaweed on a clam.

Alas for those two loving ones! she waked not from her swound,
And he was taken with the cramp, and in the waves was drowned;
But Fate has metamorphosed them, in pity of their woe,
And now they keep an oyster-shop for mermaids down below.

Background

Oliver Wendell Holmes (1809–1894) was a Boston physician, professor of anatomy at Harvard, and one of the Fireside Poets, the popular New England poets of the 19th century. He is best known for “Old Ironsides,” “The Chambered Nautilus,” and the essays of The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table, and he was the father of the Supreme Court justice of the same name.

He wrote this ballad as a young man, just out of Harvard, and published it in 1830 in The Collegian, a student magazine. Late in life, he kept it in his collected poems in a section called “Verses from the Oldest Portfolio,” with a self-mocking note that a chick “before his shell is off his back” is hardly a fair subject for severe criticism. The poem shows the comic gift that later made him one of the most admired humorists in American letters.

Analysis and Themes

The poem is a parody. It follows the shape of a tragic love ballad almost step by step, and it gets its laughs by filling that shape with the wrong details.

A Tragic Ballad Turned Inside Out

Every element of a sad folk ballad is here: two lovers on opposite banks, a moonlit signal, a secret meeting, a stern father, a fainting girl, and a drowning. Old ballads tell such stories in the same simple, repetitive language (“Then up arose,” “Out spoke”), and Holmes copies it faithfully. But the details are all slightly off. The hero is an oysterman, not a knight, and his love is not a princess but a fisherman’s daughter who waves her handkerchief to say the folks are away.

Leander in a River

The oysterman gets his idea from “the story-book”: Leander, in Greek myth, swam the Hellespont every night to reach Hero, until he drowned in a storm. The oysterman decides “I will swim this here,” turning a heroic legend into a local stunt. The comedy comes from the gap between the classical model and the plain speaker, who says “I guess” and leaves his skiff at home only for fear the neighbors will see.

Bathos and the Happy Ending

Holmes relies on bathos, a sudden drop from the lofty to the ridiculous. The girl falls “as falls a snow-white lamb,” and then her hair droops “like seaweed on a clam.” The lover dies not in a storm but from a cramp. The ending is the biggest drop of all: instead of a ghostly lament, Fate gives the lovers a small business under the water. The joke is aimed less at the lovers than at a whole fashion of weepy, moonlit verse.

Form and Technique

The poem has 28 lines in seven quatrains, rhymed in couplets (AABB). Each line is a fourteener, a long line of about 14 syllables and seven beats, often printed as two shorter lines in ballad meter. The steady, jogging rhythm is the sound of popular ballads and broadsides, which makes the comic details land harder.

Holmes borrows ballad formulas such as “Then up arose” and the repeated “Out spoke the ancient fisherman,” and he uses dialogue to speed the story along. The exchange between father and daughter in the fifth stanza, with its pebble and porpoise, is pure farce set to a solemn tune.

Notable Lines

These lines show the poem’s method of building up and then deflating.

I read it in the story-book, that, for to kiss his dear,
Leander swam the Hellespont,—and I will swim this here.”

Lines 11 to 12

A classical legend meets a plain-spoken New England oysterman.

“And what is that, pray tell me, love, that paddles off so fast?”
“It’s nothing but a porpoise, sir, that’s been a-swimming past.”

Lines 19 to 20

The daughter’s excuses are the funniest moment in the poem.

But Fate has metamorphosed them, in pity of their woe,
And now they keep an oyster-shop for mermaids down below.

Lines 27 to 28

A mock-classical transformation, in the style of Ovid, that ends the tragedy with a joke.

Themes

Three ideas run through the poem.

Parody. The poem mocks sentimental ballads by keeping their form and changing their tone.

Young love. The lovers’ secret meeting and the father’s anger are timeless, even when played for laughs.

Heroism and ordinary life. The oysterman tries to act like a hero of myth, and ordinary life, in the form of a cramp, gets in the way.

Frequently Asked Questions

These are the questions readers most often ask about “The Ballad of the Oysterman”.

What is “The Ballad of the Oysterman” about?

It is a comic ballad about a young oysterman who swims across a river at night to kiss a fisherman’s daughter. Her father nearly catches him, she faints, he drowns from a cramp, and Fate turns the two lovers into shopkeepers who sell oysters to mermaids at the bottom of the river.

Is “The Ballad of the Oysterman” serious or funny?

It is funny. Holmes borrows the form and plot of a tragic love ballad, then undercuts it with homely details, such as the girl calling her lover a porpoise and her hair drooping “like seaweed on a clam.” The mock-tragic ending is the final joke.

Who was Leander in “The Ballad of the Oysterman”?

Leander is a lover from Greek myth who swam across the Hellespont, the strait now called the Dardanelles, every night to visit Hero. One night he drowned. The oysterman copies him, and meets a similar fate in a much sillier way.

When was “The Ballad of the Oysterman” written?

Oliver Wendell Holmes wrote it as a young man and first published it in 1830 in The Collegian, a Harvard student magazine. He kept it in his collected poems for the rest of his life.

Glossary

Several words are old-fashioned or come from myth.

• pensive (line 5): Thoughtful or dreamy.
• skiff (line 10): A small, light rowboat.
• Leander (line 12): A young man in Greek myth who swam the Hellespont each night to visit Hero, until he drowned.
• Hellespont (line 12): The narrow strait between Europe and Asia, now called the Dardanelles.
• ’T was (line 18): It was.
• harpoon (line 21): A barbed spear used for catching large fish and whales.
• swound (line 25): An old word for a swoon, or faint.
• metamorphosed (line 27): Transformed, as in the myths of Ovid’s Metamorphoses.

Related Poems

If this poem makes you smile, these offer a mix of ballads and comic verse.

• The Highwayman by Alfred Noyes: A straight, tragic ballad of secret lovers and a vengeful rival, the kind of poem Holmes is teasing.
• Annabel Lee by Edgar Allan Poe: A love story that ends beside the sea, told with all the solemnity Holmes avoids.
• Jabberwocky by Lewis Carroll: Another comic poem that borrows the form of a heroic ballad.