n of his bold
features, and had made it needful to braid his still jetty black locks
together to cover his bald crown, his was a fine, striking head yet,
to my boyish fancy. I loved to sit at his feet, and hear him tell the
events of sixty years of toil and danger, suffering and well-earned
joy, as he leaned with both hands upon his stout staff, his body
swaying with the earnestness of his speech. His labors and perils were
now ended, and in his age and infirmity he had found a quiet haven. He
had built a small house by the side of the home of his childhood, and
his son, who followed his father's vocation, lived under the same
roof. This son and two daughters were all that remained to him of a
large family.

"An easterly bank and a westerly glim are certain signs of a wet
skin!" said the fisherman, pointing to the heavy black masses of cloud
that hung over the eastern horizon, one morning when I had risen at
sunrise for a day's fishing. "'T won't do; don't go out to-day!
There's soon such a breeze off shore, as, with the heavy chop, would
make you sick enough! Besides, the old dory won't put up with such a
storm as is coming. No fishing, my boy, to-day."

His old father said, "Stephen is right. There is a blow brewing." And
he came to look, leaning on his cane. "Stay in to-day."

I yielded, and the sky during the morning slowly assumed a dull,
leaden hue. The storm came on in the afternoon, heavily pattering, and
pouring, and blowing against the windows, and obscuring the little
light of an autumn twilight. I wandered through the few small rooms of
the cottage, endeavoring to amuse myself, while the light lasted, with
two funeral sermons and an old newspaper. Then I sat down at a window,
and I well remember the gloomy landscape, seen through the rain, in
the dusk:--the marsh, with the creek dividing it, the bare round
eminence between the house and the beach, or rather the rocky cliffs,
and on either side the wide, lonely sands, with heavy foam-capped
breakers rolling in upon the shore, with a sound like a solemn
dirge. At a distance on the left, half hidden by the walnut-trees, lay
the ruins of a mill, which had always the air of being haunted. A
high, rocky hill, very nearly perpendicular on the side next the
house, was covered on the sides and top with junipers, pines, and
other evergreens. As the darkness thickened, I left the lonely "best
room" for the seat in the large chimney-corner, in the kitchen. The
old w