A curious look came into the young fellow's eye, and gave me a new
interest in him. He answered:
"I like it. The wind here's like nowhere else. It plays tunes on the
trees there as it comes through, and I get the echoes of them. Sometimes
I hear the men's voices, and then I know what it is. It's the old
Norsemen going out over the sea to look at their tracks again. Bless
you, I've heard them talk about the Swan's bath. Sometimes the dead
ladies come and whisper, and I know they're walking in the woods all the
time the dusk lasts."
I stared very much. This speech did not sound very sane, and yet it was
uttered by a quiet young lad who looked as if he might be trusted. I
thought, "Oh! Here's a kind of poet, or something of that sort," and I
said, smilingly, "How do you come to know about the Norsemen, then?"
"I have several books. I got one on a stall--a very good one about
heroes. It has a lot in it about the Norsemen. If you come in you can
see my books. You might have some tea. I put the kettle ready before I
went out."
I stepped into the hut, and found it warm and cosy. A cake of barley
bread was on the table, and a little black teapot stood there also.
There was no furniture but a low wooden bed, one chair, a settle, and a
broad shelf. On the shelf was a slate scrabbled all over with
geometrical figures, and one of these figures was a parabola with two
tangents drawn touching. This puzzled me much. I sat down to warm my
hands and my half-frozen face, and when I felt comfortable I said,
"Do you read conic sections, young gentleman?"
His bonnet was off now, and I saw his broad, compact forehead and his
massive temples. He looked capable of reading anything.
He replied, quite simply:
"Oh, yes! I read geometrical conics."
"And did you teach yourself?"
"Yes. It isn't hard after you've got over the sixth book of Euclid."
I grew more and more puzzled and interested. We had some tea, which made
me feel positively luxurious, and then I looked at the backs of the
books. There were "The Pilgrim's Progress," and "Tappan on the Will."
Then came Shakespeare, a shilling edition of Keats, Drew's "Conic
Sections," Hall's "Differential Calculus," Baker's "Land Surveying,"
Carlyle's "Heroes," a fat volume of Shelley, "The Antiquary," White's
"Selborne," Bonnycastle's "Algebra," and five volumes of "The Tales of
the Borders."
"You have a capital lot of books, my man. I suppose you know them all by
heart, pretty well?"
"Yes, I know them; not by heart exactly, but I've had a lot of time
these two winters, and I've gone over them and written about them."
"Well, which do you like best of all?"
"My fancy's all for mathematics, but I like poetry."
"Ah! And I suppose you write poetry--don't you, now?"
He was not abashed--he said in an ordinary tone, "Very often. It doesn't
seem good, but I go on at it. It pleases me and puts away the time now
and then. There's some in that copy-book at your side."
I know what a fearful thing youthful poetry is, and I felt a discreet
dread. But I opened the book and saw that the young man had been writing
verses in a large strong hand. I did not read much. There was one pair
of broken quatrains which I remember:--
"Though toil is heavy I'll not be sad,
I'll rest content while my pulses beat;
If I work, and love, and trust and be glad,
Perchance the world will come to my feet.
But if no fortune ever be mine,
If my bones on this grey hill-side must lie,
As long as I breathe I'll not repine,
I've gladly lived and I'll gladly die."
"You're not very particular about the form of your verses," said I.
"No! I never count syllables. I only go by accents."
"Um! Well. I shall meet you again, and you shall come and see me."
All that winter I was secluded. Day after day broke with wild weather.
Sometimes the snow came and laid all the bracken under its gentle
coverlid. Sometimes the wind came in from the sea, and as the mad
squalls tore off the crests of the breakers, our cottage was smothered
with yellow foam. I liked to go along to the wooden hut and sit with my
young friend, although the tramp back in the chill darkness was not
always very safe. He used also to visit me, and I lent him books. He was
much taken with Burke, and would talk with a solemn enthusiasm when I
encouraged him to speak about the American war and the Revolution. He
began to try prose writing during this same winter, and I sometimes read
his attempts. After he had shown me some quiet fragments, describing his
own daily work, I advised him not to trouble himself with verse any
more, and he went on imitating his favourite prose writers with curious
persistence.
February came in, bringing worse weather than ever. One night the wind
rose so that by nine o'clock it was hardly possible to stand in the
open. The sky was like iron, and the dull red which had appeared in the
West at sundown changed to a cold, neutral dimness. The birds were in
great trouble, the gulls especially wailing with a peevish sharpness
that made the skin creep. I looked out twice into the roaring darkness,
and could see nothing except the flash of the "white horses" as they
trampled and reared far out at sea. The fire was better than that wild
company, so I sat a little, and then slept. A loud knocking awaked me,
and, going to the door, I found that the dawn had come, and that my
young friend was there.
"What is the matter?"
"Get dressed, sir. There's bad work coming, the gale's worse, and
there's a brig trying to work north. He'll never get round the point.
You go nor'ard and rouse the Hundalee men, and I'll go south and rouse
the chaps at the Bay. Good-bye."
When I got out the wind hit me so that I had to turn and gasp a second
for breath. It seemed as though the sea were going to invade the land.
There was not a vestige of black or green water for half a mile from the
beach. Nothing but wild masses of angry whiteness coiling and winding
and shivering themselves against each other. Twice the wind stopped me
as I fought my way north, and once I had fairly to lie down in a hollow
until a shrieking blast gave me leave to step on. But I got to the
village and told the men, and a dozen strong fellows went back with me.
There was no lifeboat within eight miles, so we harnessed two horses to
a pair of the ordinary wheels used to launch herring-boats after the
winter is over, and we took one of the smaller sort of trouting-boats
with us.
When we reached the Point the men from the south were there, and my
young friend was among them. All were excited, for the brig was fighting
her way still through the awful sea. She would not bear enough sail to
steady her in the least, and she could only claw her way inch by inch to
the north-east.
The Point was a long sandy spit, which sloped gradually away into deep
water. If the vessel could weather it, she might get away to the north,
but she had gone too far into the bay, and the fishermen saw that she
must choose between going ashore on the rocks of the bay and hitting the
Point. In the latter event the vessel might hold for a while before the
seas finally smashed her.
The brig rose sometimes on the cross seas until we could see her copper.
Then she would seem to strike savagely at the driving mist as her masts
lashed forward; then she would lurch to leeward, and lie for a few
horrible seconds as though she never would rise again. It could not
last. My young friend said:
"Let's get the coble down to the water's edge."
The volleys of wind and the thunder of water had frightened the horses,
and they stood trembling and cowed. The men had to let the boat slide
down the grassy channel, which was, as it were, bevelled in the low
bulge of the Point.
They had not long to wait. The brig suddenly came round, as though her
helm had been put hard up.
"Rudder's gone," said one of the fishermen.
Sea after sea struck the vessel astern, and threatened to swamp her, but
she managed always to shake herself. She came on like a cork that is
rushed down a gutter by a shower, only giving a roll and going yard-arm
under as cross-seas hit her.
At last she stopped.
"Touched," said one of the men.
But she rose again and lumbered yet a few yards forward. Then she beat
herself heavily, and the next sea doubled clean over her.
"We can't do nothin', chaps. The coble winnot get two yards till she's
over."
This came from the oldest fisherman.
"Oh! for Christ's sake, let's shove off," said my young student,
clasping his hands. He was pale, and his eyes shone, as they always did
when he was excited.
"It's very well to say shove off, my bonny man, but look at it! We
brought the boat for fear there might be a chance, but there's no chance
at all."
"I think we might just have a try," said a large, grave man. "Will three
o' you come, and I'll steer her myself?"
"I'll be one," said a stiff little man, known as "Catfish."
"Let me go," said the young rabbit-catcher.
"I can pull as well as ever a one of you," he pleaded, when the large
man looked doubtful. I wanted to go, but it was decided that a fisherman
would pull better than I. So we got the boat hurled through the smother
of foam, and presently we heard the "Crack, crack," as the vanguard of
the real water began to strike at her.
My youngster was pulling with his hat off, and I saw him now and then,
as the boat swooped upward, and hung almost perpendicularly on the
striped side of a travelling wave. I believe I prayed. An old man, whose
son was rowing the stern oar (cobles only need three oars, two on one
side, and a long one astern) said, "Lord, have mercy on you, my bonny
Harry." Then he sobbed once, and his face became fixed, like a mask of
carven stone.
I do not know how long the wild buffeting lasted, but I know that
presently the bows of the boat appeared returning over a doubling sea,
and as she made her downward flight I saw a black, huddled mass in her.
Then there was a rush, and the coble came up on the sand. Only one trip
was needed. Five men were brought ashore; the other two hands had been
taken overboard by one sea just before the ship lost her rudder.
Years went by, and I returned to dwell in cities. One evening I went to
dine at a club. I was lounging in the reading-room, when a
splendid-looking man attracted my attention. He was a magnificently-built
young fellow, with a fine beard, and bright, steel-blue eyes. When he
rose, I saw that he was perfectly dressed, and when he spoke to a waiter,
his voice seemed deep, and his accent fine.
I looked down at my paper, and I then felt that he was looking at me.
When I looked up, he had risen, and was looking steadily in my face. He
made a step forward.
"Pardon me. How very, very strange!" I said; "I'm at a loss to remember
you. You'll forgive me."
"Don't you remember the Poachers' Hollow, and the brig, and Burke, and
the Differential?"
Then I knew, and we shook hands heartily. We dined together, and he told
me how his change of fortune had come about.
"It all came through that shipwreck," he explained.
"How was that?"
"Well, directly I got home and changed, I sat down and wrote an account
of the whole concern in some very gaudy prose, and I drove the pony into
the town and handed the letter in at the 'Sentinel' office. My account
was printed. Old Mr. Willits--you remember him--sent to the editor to
know who had done it, and then sent for me. He was very grumpy and
crusty at first, but I explained my position to him simply, and he got
very good humoured. He sent me to a tutor for two years and a half; then
I won a Trinity scholarship, and scored two or three other things; then
I went to the University, and slogged like a slave. Mr. Willits helped
me. I did very well in the Tripos--not so well as men who started
younger--but still I landed ninth. Now I'm principal of the new college
that ---- endowed, and I have a very good thing indeed."
So my friend, the rabbit-catcher, became a successful man, and, I am
sure, I wished him joy.