The writings of John Greenleaf Whittier, Volume 4.
John Greenleaf Whittier, Ed.

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[237]
     ‘Oho!’ she muttered, ‘ye're brave to-day!
But I hear the little waves laugh and say,
     ‘The broth will be cold that waits at home;
For it's one to go, but another to come!’’

‘She's cursed,’ said the skipper; “speak her fair:
     I'm scary always to see her shake
Her wicked head, with its wild gray hair,
     And nose like a hawk, and eyes like a snake.”
But merrily still, with laugh and shout,
     From Hampton River the boat sailed out,
Till the huts and the flakes on Star seemed nigh,
     And they lost the scent of the pines of Rye.

They dropped their lines in the lazy tide,
     Drawing up haddock and mottled cod;
They saw not the Shadow that walked beside,
     They heard not the feet with silence shod.
But thicker and thicker a hot mist grew,
     Shot by the lightnings through and through;
And muffled growls, like the growl of a beast,
     Ran along the sky from west to east.

Then the skipper looked from the darkening sea
     Up to the dimmed and wading sun;
But he spake like a brave man cheerily,
     ‘Yet there is time for our homeward run.’
Veering and tacking, they backward wore;
     And just as a breath from the woods ashore
Blew out to whisper of danger past,
     The wrath of the storm came down at last!

The skipper hauled at the heavy sail:
     ‘God be our help!’ he only cried,