PART II.

THE ADVENTURER.

"With merchandize ashore

we hied to trafficke then, Making the sea foam us before by force of nine good men: And rowing long at last

a river we espie,

In at the which we bare full fast

to see what there might be.

And entering in we see

a number of black soules

Whose likenesses seemed men to be

but all as black as coles."

ROBERT BAKER's Rhymed Narrative. HAKLUYT, II. 519.

"Yet still his claim the injured ocean layed

And oft at leap-frog o'er their steeples played,
As if on purpose it on land had come

To show them what 's their Mare Liberum.
A daily deluge over them does boil,
The earth and water play at level-coyl,
And fish ofttimes the burgher dispossessed,
And sat, not as at meat, but as a guest."

MARVEL.

CHAPTER I.

"Who's here beside foul weather?"

"One minded like the weather, most unquietly."

ALL the afternoon there had been a murky and grizzled sky, and now the wind began to drive the rain before it up into Plymouth Bay. Mrs. Hawkins is peering from the upper balcony, whence through long hours and days, these twenty years and more, she has been accustomed to look out upon the great waters, and watch for the coming sail.

"You do not think, mother, he will come tonight?" said Bessie Hawkins.

"I can't tell, my sweet chub; but I heard of his being spoken by a Spaniard a month agone, and he ought to be in the Channel by this time."

"I guess the storm will abate, mother, and we shall wake up to-morrow morning, and find him anchored safely in the Catwater."

"The storm will not abate, but will rage dreadfully this night. Woe's my goodman if he has to beat up the bay in such a gale!"

The storm did not abate that night, but Mrs. Haw

kins knew she could not still the waves, and so she kneeled and put up a prayer, repeated a thousandth time for her dear sailor upon the deep, and she and Bessie retired to rest. Bessie thought she never saw her mother have such a look of distress.

“Why, mother, there have been worse storms than this, and I never saw you take on so. Have you dreamed anything?"

Nothing, my chubby. But I felt from the beginning that the Lord would n't prosper this voyage. I did n't dare ask him to, and I'm fearful my prayers haven't been effectual as they used to be."

"Why, mother, what's in the wind now?"

"Tush! sleep while ye are innocent, and dream of the angels. A bad world is this, my darling, and ye 'll learn that full soon enough."

Bessie slept as she was bidden, but her mother lay awake with torturing thoughts and fears, while the wind shrieked around the windows, dashing floods of water upon the panes, and up the harbor came all night the fierce complainings of the angry sea. It was past midnight before the good woman was at rest; and hence, while the morning sun is up and the storm has spent its rage, and the waters of the harbor are empurpled with light, Bessie and her mother are still asleep, while their neighbors are astir.

Knock, — knock,—somebody is at the door trying to shake it in pieces.

"Are ye all dead inside? Molly! Bess Hawkins! are ye all dead, I say?"

Bess was the first to spring up and unbar the