O’er all there hung the shadow of a fear,
A sense of mystery the spirit daunted,
And said, as plain as whisper in the ear,
The place is Haunted!

THE MARY.

A SEA-SIDE SKETCH.

Lov’st thou not, Alice, with the early tide
To see the hardy Fisher hoist his mast,
And stretch his sail towards the ocean wide,—­
Like God’s own beadsman going forth to cast
His net into the deep, which doth provide
Enormous bounties, hidden in its vast
Bosom like Charity’s, for all who seek
And take its gracious boon thankful and meek?

The sea is bright with morning,—­but the dark
Seems still to linger on his broad black sail,
For it is early hoisted, like a mark
For the low sun to shoot at with his pale
And level beams:  All round the shadowy bark
The green wave glimmers, and the gentle gale
Swells in her canvas, till the waters show
The keel’s new speed, and whiten at the bow.

Then look abaft—­(for thou canst understand
That phrase)—­and there he sitteth at the stern,
Grasping the tiller in his broad brown hand,
The hardy Fisherman.  Thou may’st discern
Ten fathoms off the wrinkles in the tann’d
And honest countenance that he will turn
To look upon us, with a quiet gaze—­
As we are passing on our several ways.

So, some ten days ago, on such a morn,
The Mary, like a seamew, sought her spoil
Amongst the finny race:  ’twas when the corn
Woo’d the sharp sickle, and the golden toil
Summon’d all rustic hands to fill the horn
Of Ceres to the brim, that brave turmoil
Was at the prime, and Woodgate went to reap
His harvest too, upon the broad blue deep.

His mast was up, his anchor heaved aboard,
His mainsail stretching in the first gray gleams
Of morning, for the wind.  Ben’s eye was stored
With fishes—­fishes swam in all his dreams,
And all the goodly east seem’d but a hoard
Of silvery fishes, that in shoals and streams
Groped into the deep dusk that fill’d the sky,
For him to catch in meshes of his eye.

For Ben had the true sailor’s sanguine heart,
And saw the future with a boy’s brave thought,
No doubts, nor faint misgivings had a part
In his bright visions—­ay, before he caught
His fish, he sold them in the scaly mart,
And summ’d the net proceeds.  This should have brought
Despair upon him when his hopes were foil’d,
But though one crop was marr’d, again he toil’d;

And sow’d his seed afresh.—­Many foul blights
Perish’d his hard-won gains—­yet he had plann’d
No schemes of too extravagant delights—­
No goodly houses on the Goodwin sand—­
But a small humble home, and loving nights,
Such as his honest heart and earnest hand
Might fairly purchase.  Were these hopes too airy? 
Such as they were, they rested on thee, Mary.