Part 3

Out from the wharf it slipped and swung-- On the old rope one moment hung-- Then snapped its tether and away For the storm-beaten outer bay.

In Whitewaters, in Whitewaters, No watcher heeds, no rescuer stirs. Out from the port the currents sweep With Hally, smiling in his sleep.

An hour they drifted, till the boat From the low shore one scarce might note. The kitten climbed the prow, and mewed Against the watery solitude.

Then Hally woke, and stared with eyes Grown round and dark with grieved surprise. Where were the children gone? And where The gray old wharf, the weedy stair?

Bewildered, and but half awake, He sobbed as if his heart would break; Then, as his lonely terror grew, Down in the boat himself he threw,

And passionately for comfort pressed The kind white kitten to his breast. Through the thin plank his hand could feel The little eddies clutch the keel;

Lost and alone, lost and alone, He heard the long wave hiss and moan, He heard the wild ebb seethe and mourn Along the outer shoals forlorn.

And now a wind that chafed the flood Blew down from Noel’s haunted wood; And now in the dread tides that run Past the grim front of Blomidon,

Over the rolling troughs, between The purple gulfs, the slopes of green, With sickening glide and sullen rest The old boat climbed from crest to crest.

* * * * *

That day in his good ship, “The Foam,” Shipmaster Clive was speeding home; His heart was light, his eyes elate; His voyage had been fortunate.

“If the wind holds,” said he, “to-night We’ll anchor under Kingsport Light;-- I’ll change the fogs of Fundy wild For Whitewaters and wife and child.”

He marked the drifting boat, and laughed, “What clumsy lubber’s lost his craft?” “What’s that that walks the gunwale?” cried A sailor leaning o’er the side.

The Captain raised his glass. Said he-- “A kitten! Some one’s pet, maybe! We’ll give it passage in ‘The Foam’”-- Soft is the heart that’s bound for home!

“Stop for a kitten?” growled the mate:-- “Look to the sun; we’re getting late! If we lose this tack we’ll lie to-night A long ways off o’ Kingsport Light.”

The Captain paused irresolute;-- “To leave the helpless little brute To the wrecked seaman’s death accurst, The slow fierce hunger, the mad thirst,--

“I wish not my worst enemy Such death as that! Lay to!” said he. The ship came up into the wind; The slackening canvas flapped and dinned;

And the ship’s boat with scant delay Was swung and lowered and away,-- The Captain at the helm, and four Stout men of Avon at the oar.

They neared the drifting craft; and when They bumped against her gunwale, then Hally upraised his tumbled head! “My God! My boy!” the Captain said.

* * * * *

And now with bellying sails “The Foam” Up the tossed flood went straining home; The wind blew fair; she lay that night At anchor under Kingsport Light.

And late that night, in gladness deep Sank father, mother, child, to sleep,-- Where no storm breaks, nor terror stirs The peace of God in Whitewaters.

The Forest Fire

The night was grim and still with dread; No star shone down from heaven’s dome; The ancient forest closed around The settler’s lonely home.

There came a glare that lit the north; There came a wind that roused the night; But child and father slumbered on, Nor felt the growing light.

There came a noise of flying feet, With many a strange and dreadful cry; And sharp flames crept and leapt along The red verge of the sky.

There came a deep and gathering roar. The father raised his anxious head; He saw the light, like a dawn of blood, That streamed across his bed.

It lit the old clock on the wall, It lit the room with splendor wild, It lit the fair and tumbled hair Of the still sleeping child;

And zigzag fence, and rude log barn, And chip-strewn yard, and cabin gray, Glowed crimson in the shuddering glare Of that untimely day.

The boy was hurried from his sleep; The horse was hurried from his stall; Up from the pasture clearing came The cattle’s frightened call.

The boy was snatched to the saddle-bow. Wildly, wildly, the father rode. Behind them swooped the hordes of flame And harried their abode.

The scorching heat was at their heels; The huge roar hounded them in their flight; Red smoke and many a flying brand Flew o’er them through the night.

And past them fled the wildwood forms-- Far-striding moose, and leaping deer, And bounding panther, and coursing wolf, Terrible-eyed with fear.

And closer drew the fiery death; Madly, madly, the father rode; The horse began to heave and fail Beneath the double load.

The father’s mouth was white and stern, But his eyes grew tender with long farewell. He said: “Hold fast to your seat, Sweetheart, And ride Old Jerry well!

“I must go back. Ride on to the river. Over the ford and the long marsh ride, Straight on to the town. And I’ll meet you, Sweetheart, Somewhere on the other side.”

He slipped from the saddle. The boy rode on. His hand clung fast in the horse’s mane; His hair blew over the horse’s neck; His small throat sobbed with pain.

“Father! Father!” he cried aloud. The howl of the fire-wind answered him With the hiss of soaring flames, and crash Of shattering limb on limb.

But still the good horse galloped on, With sinew braced and strength renewed. The boy came safe to the river ford, And out of the deadly wood.

* * * * *

And now with his kinsfolk, fenced from fear, At play in the heart of the city’s hum, He stops in his play to wonder why His father does not come!

The Vengeance of Gluskâp

_A Micmac Legend_

Gluskâp, the friend and father of his race, With help in need went journeying three days’ space.

His village slept, and took no thought of harm, Secure beneath the shadow of his arm.

But wandering wizards watched his outward path, And marked his fenceless dwelling for their wrath.

They came upon the tempest’s midnight wings, With shock of thunder and the lightning’s slings, And flame, and hail, and all disastrous things.

When home at length the hero turned again, His huts were ashes and his servants slain; And o’er the ruin wept a slow, great rain.

He wept not; but he cried a mighty word Across the wandering sea, and the sea heard.

Then came great whales, obedient to his hand, And bare him to the demon-haunted land,

Where, in malign morass and ghostly wood And grim cliff-cavern, lurked the evil brood.

And scarce the avenger’s foot had touched their coast Ere horror seized on all the wizard host, And in their hiding-places hushed the boast.

He grew and gloomed before them like a cloud, And his eye drew them till they cried aloud,

And withering like spent flame before his frown They ran forth in a madness and fell down.

Rank upon rank they lay without a moan,-- His finger touched them, and their hearts grew stone.

All round the coasts he heaped their stiffened clay; And the seamews wail o’er them to this day.

The Muse and the Wheel

The poet took his wheel one day A-wandering to go, But soon fell out beside the way, The leaves allured him so.

He leaned his wheel against a tree And in the shade lay down; And more to him were bloom and bee Than all the busy town.

He listened to the Phœbe-bird And learned a thing worth knowing. He lay so still he almost heard The merry grasses growing.

He lay so still he dropped asleep; And then the Muse came by. The stars were in her garment’s sweep, But laughter in her eye.

“Poor boy!” she said, “how tired he seems! His vagrant feet must follow So many loves, so many dreams,-- (To find them mostly hollow!)

“No marvel if he does not feel My old familiar nearness!” And then her gaze fell on his wheel And wondered at its queerness.

“Can you be Pegasus,” she mused, “To modern mood translated, But poorly housed, and meanly used, And grown attenuated?

“Ah, no, you’re quite another breed From him who once would follow Across the clear Olympian mead The calling of Apollo!

“No Hippocrene would leap to light If you should stamp your hoof. You never knew the pastures bright Wherein we lie aloof.

“You never drank of Helicon, Or strayed in Tempe’s vale. You never soared against the sun Till earth grew faint and pale.

“You bear my poor deluded boy Each latest love to see! But Pegasus would mount with joy And bring him straight to me!”

He woke. The olden spell was strong Within his eager bosom; And so he wrote a mystic song Upon the nearest blossom.

He wrote, until a sudden whim Set all his bosom trembling; Then sped to woo a maiden slim His latest love resembling.

The “Laughing Sally”

A wind blew up from Pernambuco. (Yeo heave ho! the “Laughing Sally”! Hi yeo, heave away!) A wind blew out of the east-sou’-east And boomed at the break of day.

The “Laughing Sally” sped for her life, And a speedy craft was she. The black flag flew at her top to tell How she took toll of the sea.

The wind blew up from Pernambuco; And in the breast of the blast Came the King’s black ship, like a hound let slip On the trail of the “Sally” at last.

For a day and a night, a night and a day; Over the blue, blue round, Went on the chase of the pirate quarry, The hunt of the tireless hound.

“Land on the port bow!” came the cry; And the “Sally” raced for shore, Till she reached the bar at the river-mouth Where the shallow breakers roar.

She passed the bar by a secret channel With clear tide under her keel,-- For he knew the shoals like an open book, The captain at the wheel.

She passed the bar, she sped like a ghost, Till her sails were hid from view By the tall, liana’d, unsunned boughs O’erbrooding the dark bayou.

At moonrise up to the river-mouth Came the King’s black ship of war. The red cross flapped in wrath at her peak, But she could not cross the bar.

And while she lay in the run of the seas, By the grimmest whim of chance Out of a bay to the north came forth Two battle-ships of France.

On the English ship the twain bore down Like wolves that range by night; And the breaker’s roar was heard no more In the thunder of the fight.

The crash of the broadsides rolled and stormed To the “Sally,” hid from view Under the tall, liana’d boughs Of the moonless, dark bayou.

A boat ran out for news of the fight, And this was the word she brought-- “The King’s ship fights the ships of France As the King’s ships all have fought!”

Then muttered the mate, “I’m a man of Devon!” And the captain thundered then-- “There’s English rope that bides for our necks, But we all be English men!”

The “Sally” glided out of the gloom And down the moon-white river. She stole like a gray shark over the bar Where the long surf seethes forever.

She hove to under a high French hull, And the red cross rose to her peak. The French were looking for fight that night, And they hadn’t far to seek.

Blood and fire on the streaming decks, And fire and blood below; The heat of hell, and the reek of hell, And the dead men laid a-row!

And when the stars paled out of heaven And the red dawn-rays uprushed, The oaths of battle, the crash of timbers, The roar of the guns were hushed.

With one foe beaten under his bow, The other afar in flight, The English captain turned to look For his fellow in the fight.

The English captain turned, and stared;-- For where the “Sally” had been Was a single spar upthrust from the sea With the red-cross flag serene!

* * * * *

A wind blew up from Pernambuco,-- (Yeo heave ho! the “Laughing Sally”! Hi yeo, heave away!) And boomed for the doom of the “Laughing Sally,” Gone down at the break of day.

TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE

Obvious typographical errors and punctuation errors have been corrected after careful comparison with other occurrences within the text and consultation of external sources.

Except for those changes noted below, all misspellings in the text, and inconsistent or archaic usage, have been retained.

Pg 87: Blank line inserted after ‘And to have one’s fling!’ Pg 95: ‘Ludum, venirem, vinum’ replaced by ‘Ludum, venerem, vinum’.

End of Project Gutenberg's The Book of the Native, by Charles G. D. Roberts