Ballads of Lost Haven Part 3

And of all the fleet of Grand Lat.i.te, Her pride was the Nancy's Pride.

So the little vessel faded down With her creaking boom a-swing, Till a wind from the deep came up with a creep, And caught her wing and wing.

She made for the lost horizon line, Where the clouds a-castled lay, While the boil and seethe of the open sea Hung on her frothing way.

She lifted her hull like a breasting gull Where the rolling valleys be, And dipped where the s.h.i.+ning porpoises Put ploughshares through the sea.

A fading sail on the far sea-line, About the turn of the tide, As she made for the Banks on her maiden cruise, Was the last of the Nancy's Pride.

To-day a boy with goldy hair, In a garden of Grand Lat.i.te, From his mother's knee looks out to sea For the coming of the fleet.

They all may home on a sleepy tide, To the flap of the idle sail; But it's never again the Nancy's Pride That answers a human hail.

They all may home on a sleepy tide To the sag of an idle sheet; But it's never again the Nancy's Pride That draws men down the street.

On the Banks to-night a fearsome sight The fishermen behold, Keeping the ghost watch in the moon When the small hours are cold.

When the light wind veers, and the white fog clears, They see by the after rail An unknown schooner creeping up With mildewed spar and sail.

Her crew lean forth by the rotting shrouds, With the Judgment in their face; And to their mates' "G.o.d save you!"

Have never a word of grace.

Then into the gray they sheer away, On the awful polar tide; And the sailors know they have seen the wraith Of the missing Nancy's Pride.

ARNOLD, MASTER OF THE SCUD

There's a schooner out from Kingsport, Through the morning's dazzle-gleam, Snoring down the Bay of Fundy With a norther on her beam.

How the tough wind springs to wrestle, When the tide is on the flood!

And between them stands young daring-- Arnold, master of the Scud.

He is only "Martin's youngster,"

To the Minas coasting fleet, "Twelve year old, and full of Satan As a nut is full of meat."

With a wake of froth behind him, And the gold green waste before, Just as though the sea this morning Were his boat pond by the door,

Legs a-straddle, grips the tiller This young waif of the old sea; When the wind comes harder, only Laughs "Hurrah!" and holds her free.

Little wonder, as you watch him With the dash in his blue eye, Long ago his father called him "Arnold, Master," on the sly,

While his mother's heart foreboded Reckless father makes rash son.

So to-day the schooner carries Just these two whose will is one.

Now the wind grows moody, s.h.i.+fting Point by point into the east.

Wing and wing the Scud is flying With her scuppers full of yeast.

And the father's older wisdom On the sea-line has descried, Like a stealthy cloud-bank making Up to windward with the tide,

Those tall navies of disaster, The pale squadrons of the fog, That maraud this gray world border Without pilot, chart, or log,

Ranging wanton as marooners From Minudie to Manan.

"Heave to, and we'll reef, my master!"

Cries he; when no will of man

Spills the foresail, but a clumsy Wind-flaw with a hand like stone Hurls the boom round. In an instant Arnold, Master, there alone

Sees a crushed corpse shot to seaward, With the gray doom in its face; And the climbing foam receives it To its everlasting place.

What does Arnold, Master, think you?

Whimper like a child for dread?

That's not Arnold. Foulest weather Strongest sailors ever bred.

And this slip of taut sea-faring Grows a man who throttles fear.

Let the storm and dark in spite now Do their worst with valor here!

Not a reef and not a s.h.i.+ver, While the wind jeers in her shrouds, And the flauts of foam and sea-fog Swarm upon her deck in crowds,

Flies the Scud like a mad racer; And with iron in his frown, Holding hard by wrath and dreadnought, Arnold, Master, rides her down.

Let the taffrail shriek through foam-heads!

Let the licking seas go glut Elsewhere their old hunger, baffled!

Arnold's making for the Gut.

Cleft sheer down, the sea-wall mountains Give that one port on the coast; Made, the Basin lies in suns.h.i.+ne!

Missed, the little Scud is lost!

Come now, fog-horn, let your warning Rip the wind to starboard there!

Suddenly that burly-throated Welcome ploughs the c.u.mbered air.

The young master hauls a little, Crowds her up and sheets her home, Heading for the narrow entry Whence the safety signals come.

Then the wind lulls, and an eddy Tells of ledges, where away; Veers the Scud, sheet free, sun breaking, Through the rifts, and--there's the bay!

Like a bird in from the storm-beat, As the summer sun goes down, Slows the schooner to her moorings By the wharf at Digby town.

All the world next morning wondered.

Largest letters, there it stood, "Storm in Fundy. A Boy's Daring.

Arnold, Master of the Scud."

THE s.h.i.+PS OF ST. JOHN

Smile, you inland hills and rivers!

Flush, you mountains in the dawn!