The Romance of the Coast | Page 6

that the little craft gained. All the world for
her depended on the chance of weathering that perilous turn. The sail
was hardly to be seen for the drift that was plucked off the crests of the
waves. Too soon Peggy saw a great roller double over and fold itself
heavily into the boat. Then there was the long wallowing lurch, and the
rudder came up, while the mast and the sodden sail went under. It was
bad enough for a woman to read in some cold official list about the
death of her father, her husband, her son; but very much worse it is for
the woman who sees her dearest drowning--standing safe ashore to
watch every hopeless struggle for life. One of the fishers said to Peggy,
"Come thy ways in, my woman; and we'll away and seek them." But
Peggy walked fast across the sand and down to the place where she
knew the set of the tide would carry the dead lads in. The father came
first ashore. She wiped the froth from his lips and closed his eyes, and
then hastened further northward where her eldest son was flung on the

beach. Peggy saw in an instant that his face was bruised, and moaned at
the sight of the bruises; his father looked as though he were sleeping.
The other lads did not come ashore till next day, and Peggy would not
go home all the night through. In the dark she got away from the kind
fellows who stayed by her; and when they sought her she was kneeling
in the hollow of a sand-hill where another of her boys lay--her face
pressed against the grass.
These bold fellows were laid in the ground, and next day Peggy started
silently to work. The grandfather--that is, her husband's father, an old
man, quite broken by the loss of his son--was brought home to his son's
fireside, where the two may be seen to-day: their thoughts divided
between their dead and the business of getting bread for to-morrow.

THE VETERAN.
In the mornings a chair used to be placed on the cliff-side facing the sea,
and towards ten o'clock a very old man would walk slowly down the
village street and take his seat. A little shelf held his pipe and
tobacco-jar, and he would sit and smoke contentedly until the afternoon.
The children used to play around him with perfect confidence, although
he seldom spoke to them. His face looked as if it were roughly carved
out of stone, and his complexion was of a deep rich brown. On his
watch-chain he wore several trinkets, and he was specially proud of one
thin disk: this was the Nile medal; for the old man had been in the fight
at Aboukir. He seldom spoke about his experience of life on board a
man-of-war; he was far more interested in bestowing appreciative
criticism on the little coasters that flitted past northward and southward,
and in saying severe things about the large screw colliers. But although
he had little to tell about his fighting experiences, he was a hero none
the less. He lived in a little white cottage at the high end of the Green,
and a woman came every morning to attend to his simple wants; for his
old wife had died long ago. He was lonely, and not much noticed
outside the village; yet he had done, in his time, one of the finest things
known in the history of bravery.

The Veteran lived happily in his way. He had made some money in a
small sloop with which he used to run round to the Firth; good things
were sent to him from the Hall; and the head gardener had orders to let
him have whatever fruit and vegetables he wanted. He had no wish to
see populous places: his uneventful life was varied enough for his
desires. If he were properly coaxed, he was willing to tell many things
about Nelson; but, strange to say, he was not fond of the great Admiral.
Collingwood was his man, and he always spoke with reverence about
the north-country sailor. He cared very little for glory; and he estimated
men on the simple principle that one kind man is worth twenty clever
ones and a hundred plucky ones. The story of his acquaintance with
Collingwood and Nelson was strange. In 1797 the Veteran was just
nineteen years old; but he had already got command of a little sloop
that plied up the Firth, and he was accounted one of the best sailors on
the coast. His father was a hearty man of eight-and-forty, and had
retired from the sea.
Now it happened that the wealthiest shipowner of the little port had a
very wild and unsteady son,