“Time enough to talk about payment when we get there,” said the old
man. “When do 'ee want to start?”
“At once, if possible.”
“If 'ee really want to go us can start at half-flood.”
Peter assured the old man that he was in earnest, and the latter
hobbled away over the cobbles, promising to be back in an hour's time.
* * * * *
“You're never going to sea with Old John, are you, mister?” said one
of the fishermen anxiously. “He was a rare bold seaman in his day, but
his day has passed this many a year. He was old when we were boys. Old
John says he'll last as long as a deep-sea wind-jammer remains afloat.
But he's daft. You oughtn't to listen to him. It's all old wives'
foolishness about Hi-Brasil.”
But Peter would not be dissuaded, and an hour later, when the
pilchard-boats jostled each other between the Mousehole pier-heads, and
spread across Mount's Bay for sea-room, Peter and John, in a crazy old
mackerel-boat, went with them. The setting sun gleamed on the brown
sails of the pilchard fleet, and Peter drew a deep breath of delight.
He knew that he would soon see the Sea Maid again.
At midnight the pilchard fleet was a line of riding lights on the
horizon behind them. When the sun rose the Scillies lay to the north of
them. Passing under the lofty Head of Peninnis, they exchanged hails
with a fisherman of St. Mary's who was hauling his lobster-pots.
“Going far?” asked the fisherman.
“Aye, far enough,” answered John.
“Looks like it's coming on to blow from the east,” said the fisherman.
“Like enough,” answered John, and they passed out of hearing.
By midday a fresh wind was blowing. The mackerel-boat's faded,
much-patched sails tugged at her mast, and she groaned as she leaped
from the tops of the waves.
“Afeard, be 'ee?” asked Old John.
“Not I,” said Peter.
“The harder it blows, the quicker we'll get there,” said John, and not
another word was said.
By night-time it was blowing a gale. A driving, following sea hustled
and banged the boat from wave to wave, and the night fell so dark that
Peter could not see the old man sitting motionless at the tiller,
except when a wave broke in foam and formed a great white background
behind him. Peter felt no fear. He knew with the certainty that admits
of no argument that he was on his way at last to his beloved.
The wind hummed in the boat's rigging with a droning note like that
of the Sea Maid's song. The waves washed along her counter, flinging
aboard stinging showers of spray that drenched Peter as he sat on the
midship thwart. The jib flapped and tugged at its sheet when her stern
rose on a wave and groaned with the strain as her bow lifted. Each
time she strained streams of water gushed through her crazy seams. At
last a fierce gust of wind drove her nose so deep into the water that
it poured in a cascade over her bows, and then a great, curving comber
broke over them. Peter was washed from his seat and jammed between the
mast and the leech of the mainsail as the water rose over his head.
* * * * *
When Peter recovered consciousness the sun was shining, the air was
warm, the sea still, and the mackerel-boat, with Old John still at the
tiller, was entering the mouth of a great land-locked harbor. Cliffs,
gay with heather and golden gorse, sheltered it from the wind. The
lazy, offshore breeze was fragrant with the smell of thyme. Shoals of
fish played in the clear water, and on the far side a stream of fresh
water rippled over golden sand.
Peter rubbed his eyes and looked around him with amazement. The harbor
was thronged with shipping of every size, shape, and rig: yachts and
smacks, schooners and ketches, tramp steamers and ocean-liners, barks
and full-rigged ships, galleys and galleons, cogs and caracks, dromons
and balingers, aphracts and cataphracts.
“See that vessel?” said Old John, as they passed under the stern of a
stoutly built brig. “That's Franklin's ship, the _Terror_--crushed in
the ice, she was, off Beechey Island in the Arctic. And that little
craft alongside of her is the _Revenge_. She sank in the Azores after
fighting fifty-three Spaniards for a day and a night. Away over there
is what they used to call a trireme. Cleared from the Port of Tyre, she
did, when I was young, and foundered off Marazion, just where we left
the pilchard fleet.”
But Peter was not listening. He was eagerly watching a yawl that was
scudding toward them; for the yawl was the _Maeldune_, and under the
arched foot of her mainsail the Sea Maid was smiling a greeting.
SUGGESTIVE QUESTIONS
1. Why did the author make his hero “the dullest man that ever
audited an account”?
2. Point out, and explain, all the classical and literary
allusions.
3. Why did the author make his story so largely realistic?
4. What is the effect of the songs?
5. How does the author make his story clear?
6. Comment on the author's use of conversation.
7. In what respects is the story poetic?
8. What effect does Old John contribute to the story?
9. What is the effect of the abrupt ending?
10. What makes the story unusually artistic?
SUBJECTS FOR WRITTEN IMITATION
1. Utopia 11. The World of Puck and
Oberon
2. Castles in Spain 12. The Summit of Olympus
3. The Fountain of Youth 13. Eldorado
4. Arcadia 14. St. Brendan's Isle
5. The Garden of the 15. Lyonesse
Hesperides
6. Over the Mountains 16. The Fortunate Islands
7. The Happy Valley 17. The Land of the Lotus
8. The Land of Dreams 18. The Lost Atlantis
9. The Isle of Avalon 19. At Camelot
10. The Enchanted World 20. The Land of Heart's Delight
DIRECTIONS FOR WRITING
It is not easy to write, even with only a small degree of success,
so happily suggestive a story as _Hi-Brasil_. Such a story is the
product both of experience and of art.
The best that you can do is to think of some longing that has
possessed you, as the longing for the sea possessed the author of
_Hi-Brasil_. Take some prosaic character, not usually moved by
such longings as your own, and show him brought strongly under
the influence of a great desire. Make your story so realistic that it
will seem true, and so symbolic that it will be at once poetic and
capable of conveying a strong idea. Do all in your power to make
your story crystal-clear, strongly outlined, and effective in power.