with a glance which showed that her eye was following in the train of her affections. The maiden's brow saddened at once, as she beheld the thick gathering of the clouds; and depositing her treasure in her bosom, she continued to gaze on the darkening sea, with a look of increasing emotion.

The experienced mariners on the Scottish and Cumbrian coasts, appeared busy mooring, and double mooring their vessels. Some sought a securer haven, and those who allowed their barks to remain, prepared them, with all their skill for the encounter of a storm, which no one reckoned distant. Something now appeared in the space between the sea and the cloud, and emerging more fully, and keeping the centre of the sea, it was soon known to be a heavily laden ship, apparently making for the haven of Allanbay.When the cry of "A ship! a ship!" arose among the reapers, one of the old men, whose eyes were something faded, after gazing intently, said, with a tone of sympathy," It is a ship indeed-and woes me, but the path it is in be perilous in a moment like this!"

"She'll never pass the sunken rocks of St. Bee's head," said one old man : "nor weather the headland of Barnhourie, and the caverns of Colven," said another:-" and should she pass both," said a third," the coming tempest, which now heaves up the sea within a cable's length of her stern, will devour her ere she finds shelter in kindly Allanbay!"

"Gude send," said he of the mixed brood of Cumberland and Caledonia,― "since she maun be wrecked, that she spills nae her treasure on the thankless shores of Galloway! These northerns be a keen people with a ready hand, and a clutch-like steel besides, she seems a Cumberland bark, and it's meet that we have our ain fish-guts to our ain sea-maws.'

'Oh see, see!" said the old man, whose three children had perished when the Bonie Babie Allan sank-" see how

the waves are beginning to be lifted up! Hearken how deep calls to deep; and hear, and see, how the winds and the windows of heaven are loosened ! Save thy servants-even those seafaring men-should there be but one righteous person on board!"-And the old reaper rose, and stretched out his hands in supplication as he spoke.

The ship came boldly down the midple of the bay, the masts bending and quivering, and the small deck crowded with busy men, who looked wistfully to the coast of Cumberland.

"She is the Lady Johnston of Annanwater," said one, "coming with wood from Norway."

"She is the Buxom Bess of Allan

bay," said another, "laden with the best of West India rum."

"And I," said the third old man, "would have thought her the Mermaid of Richard Faulder-but," added he, in a lower tone, "the Mermaid has not been heard of, nor seen, for many months;—and the Faulders are a doomed race-his bonny brig and he are at the bottom of the sea; and with them sleeps the pride of Cumberland, Frank Forster of Derwentwater."

The subject of their conversation approached within a couple of miles, turned her head to Allanbay, and, though the darkness almost covered her as with a shroud, there seemed every chance that she would reach the port ere the tempest burst. But just as she turned for the Cumbrian shore, a rush of wind shot across the bay, furrowing the sea as hollow as the deepest glen, and heaving it up masthead high. The cloud too dropt down upon the surface of the sea, the winds, loosened at once, lifted the waves in multitudes against the cliffs; and the foam fell upon the reapers, like a shower of snow. The loud chafing of the waters on the rocks, prevented the peasants from hearing the cries of men whom they had given up to destruction. At length the wind, which came in whirlwind gusts, becoming silent for a little while, the voice of

But, although Richard Faulder and his Mermaid were now little more than a cable-length distant from the land, the peril of their situation seemed little lessened. The winds had greatly abated, but the sea, with that impulse communicated by the storm,-threw itself against the rocks, elevating its waters high over the summits of the highest cliffs, and leeping and foaming around the bark, with a force that made her reel and quiver, and threatened to stave her to pieces.-The old and skilful mariner himself was observed, amid the confusion and danger, as collected and self-possessed as if he had been entering the bay in the tranquillity of a summer evening, with a hundred hands waving and welcoming his return. His spirit and deliberation seemed more or less communicated to his little crew; but chiefly to Frank Forster, who, in the ardent buoyancy of youth,-moved as he moved, thought as he thought, and acted from his looks alone, as if they had been both informed from one soul. In those times, the benevolence of individuals had not been turned to multiply the means of preserving seamen's lives; and the mariner, in the hour of peril, owed his life to chancehis own endeavours-or the intrepid exertions of the humane peasantry.— The extreme agitation of the sea rendered it difficult to moor or abandon the bark with safety: and several young men ventured fearlessly into the flood on horeback, but could not reach the rope which the crew threw out to form a communication with the land. Young Forster, whose eye seemed to have singled out some object of regard on shore, seized the rope; then leaping, with a plunge, into the sea, he made the waters flash!-Though for a moment he seemed swallowed up, he emerged from the billows like a waterfowl, and swam shoreward with unexpected agility and strength. The old mariner gazed after him with a look of deep concern,—but none seemed more alarmed than the maiden with many keep-sakes. As he

seized the rope, the lilly suddenly chased the rose from her cheek, and uttering a loud scream, and crying out,-"Oh help him, save him!"-she flew down to the shore, and plunged into the water, holding out her arms, while the flood burst against her, breast high.

"God guide me, Maud Marchbank," cried William Selby," ye'll drown the poor lad out of pure love.-I think," continued he, stepping back, and shaking the brine from his clothes, "I am the mad person myself-a caress and a kiss from young Frank of Derwentwater is making her comfortable enough. Alas, but youth be easily pleased-it is as the northern song says—

Contented wi' little and cantie wi' mair'; but old age is a delightless time!"

To moor the bark was the labour of a few moments, and fathers, and mothers, and sisters, and sweethearts, welcomed the youths they had long reckoned among the dead with affection and tears. All had some friendly hand and eye to welcome and rejoice in them, save the brave old mariner, Richard Faulder alone. To him no one spoke, on him no eye was turned; all seemed desirous of shunning communication with a man to whom common belief attributed endowments and powers, which came not as knowledge and might come to other men,-and whose wisdom was of that kind against which the most prudent divines, and the most skilful legislators, directed the rebuke of church and law. I remember hearing my father say, that when Richard Faulder, who was equally skilful in horsemanship and navigation, offered to stand on his grey horse's bare back, and gallop down the street of Allanbay, he was prevented from betting against the accomplishment of this equestrian vaunt, by a wary Scotchman, who, in the brief manner of his country said, "dinna wager, Thomas-God guide yere wits

-that man's no cannie !"-At that time, though a stripling of seventeen, and possessed strongly with the belief

of the mariner's singular powers, I could not avoid sympathizing with his fortune, and the forlorn look with which he stood on the deck, while his companions were welcomed and caressed on shore. Nothing, indeed, could equal the joy which fathers and mothers manifested towards their children,-but the affection and tenderness with which they were hailed by the bright eyes of the Cumbrian maidens.

"His name be praised," said one old man, to whose bosom a son had been unexpectedly delivered from the waves. "And blessed be the hour ye were saved from the salt sea, and that fearful man," said a maiden, whose blushing cheek, and brightening eye indicated more than common sympathy.

"And oh! Stephen Porter, my son," resumed the father, "never set foot on shipboard with that mariner more!"

In another group stood a young seaman with his sister's arms linked round his neck; receiving the blessings, and the admonitions, which female lips shower so vainly upon the sterner sex:-"" "This is the third time, Giles, thou hast sailed with Richard Faulder; and every time my alarm and thy perils encrease. Many a fair face he has witnessed the loss of, and many a fair ship he has survived the wreck of:-think of the sea, since think of it thou must-but never more think of it with such a companion."

In another group, a young woman stood gazing on a sailor's face, and, in her looks, fear and love held equal mas

tery. "Oh! William Rowenberry," said she, and her hand trembled with affection in his while she spoke,—“ I would have held my heart widowed for one year and a day, in memory of thee

and there be fair lads in Ullswater, and fairer still in Allanbay,-I'll no say they would have prevailed against my regard for thee before the summer.But I warn thee," and she whispered, waving her hand seaward, to give importance to her words,-" never be found on the great deep with that man with thee again!".

Meanwhile, the subject of this singular conversation kept pacing from stern to stern of the Mermaid-gazing, now and then wistfully shoreward-though he saw not a soul with whom he might share his affections. His grey hair, and his melancholy look, won their way to my youthful regard, while his hale and stalwart frame could not fail of making an impression on one not wholly insensible to the merits of the exterior person. A powerful mind, in poetical justice, should have a noble place of abode. I detached myself a little from the mass of people that filled the shore, and seeming to busy myself with some drift wood which the storm had brought to the hollow of a small rock, I had an opportunity of hearing the old mariner chant, as he paced to and fro, the fragment of an old maritime ballad-part of which is still current among the seamen of Solway, along with many other singular rhymes full of marine superstition and adventure.