The Gateway to Spenser. Tales Retold by Emily Underdown from The Faerie Queene of Edmund Spenser (1913)

THE DEFEAT OF
BEAST.
THE BLATANT
Like as a ship, that through the ocean wide
Directs her course unto one certain coast,
Is met of many a counter wind and tide.
With which her winged speed is let andcross'd.
And she herself in stormy surges toss'd ;
Yet, making many a board * and many a bay,
Still winneth way, ne hath her compass lost ;
Right so it fares with me in this long way,
Whose course is often stay'd, yet never is
astray.
For all
that hitherto hath long delay'd
This gentle knight from 'suing his first quest,
Though out of course, yet hath not been
mis-said,
* " To make a board," or " to board it up to a place," is
to turn the ship to windward, sometimes on one tack, sometimes
on the other.