Courier Democrat. (Langdon, N.D.) 1891-1920, 1891-12-10

by the GUNNER OF the embers when
hickered on the hearth, and Redeemed
the dark rafters overhead. The fish
erman's nets were hanging on the wall.
Some homely pots and pans twinkled
on a rough shelf in the corner. Beside
a great bed with long, falling curtains,
a mattress was extended on a couple
OF old benches on which five little
children were asleep like cherubs in a
nest. By the bedside, with her fore
head pressed against the counterpart,
knelt the children's mother. She was
alone. Outside, the black ocean,
dashed with stormy snow-flakes,
moaned and murmured, and her hus-
band was at sea.
From his boyhood he had been
fisherman. His life, as one may say,
had been daily fight with the great
waters, for every day the children
must befed, for every day, rain, wind,
or tempest, out went his boat to fish.
And while in his four-sailed boat he
piled his solitary task at sea, his wife
ct home stitched the sails, mended
the nets, looked to the hooks or
watched the little fire where the fish
soup was boiling. AS soon as the five
children were asleep she fell upon her
knees and prayed to heaven for her
husband in his struggle with the waves
| and darkness.
And truly such a life as his was
hard. The likeliest place for fish was
a mere speck among the breakers,
not more than twice as large as his
own cabin-a spot obscure, capric-
ious, changing on the moving desert,
and yet which had to be discovered
in the fog and tempest OF a winter
night by sheer skill and knowledge of
the tide and winds. And there-while
the gliding waves ran past like
emerald serpents and the gulf OF
darkness rolled and tossed, and the
streaming rigging groaned as if in ter
ror-there, amid the icy seas he
thought Of his own Jenny; and Jenny,
in her cottage, thought OF him with
| tears.
She was thinking of him then and
praying. The seagull's harsh and
knocking cry distressed her, and the
roaring of the pillows on the reef
alarmed her soul. But she was wrap
ped in thoughts thoughts of their
poverty. Their little children went
barefooted winter and summer.
Wheat bread they never ate, and on
ly bread of barley. Heavens! the wind
roared like the pillows OF a forge, and
the seacoast echoed like an anvil.
She wept and trembled Poor wives
whose husbands are at sea! How ter
rible to say, "My dear ones-father,
lover, brothers, sons-are in the tenn
pest!" But Jenny was still more I'M
happy her husband was alone-alone
without assistance on this bitter
night. Her children were too little to
assist him. Poor mother! Now she
says, 81 wish they were grown up to
help their father Foolish dream!
In years to come, when they are
with their father in the tempest, she
will say, with tears, wish they were
but children still" .e
Jenny took her lantern and her
cloak "It is time," she said to her.
self, ''to see whether he is coming
back, whether the sea is calmer, and
whether the light is burning on the
signal mast" She went out. There
was nothing to be seen,-barely a
streak OF white on the horizon. twas
raining the dark, cold rain Of early
morning. No cabin window showed a
ray OF light.
All at once, while peering round her,
her eyes perceived a tumble-down old
cabin, which showed no sign Of light
or fire. The door was swinging in the
wind; the worm-eaten walls seemed
scarcely able to support the crazy
roof, on which the wind shook the
yellow, filthy tufts OF rotten thatch.
Stay" she cried. II am forgetting
the poor widow whom my husband
found the other day alone and i'll. +
must see how she is getting on.
She knocked at the door and listened.
No one answered Jenny shivered in
the cold sea wind.
"She is i'll. And her poor childrenl
PIShe has only two OF them; but she is