eak you, and throw you down like a
weed.

You may chance it awhile with the girls like that, if you please;
But you want a woman to trust when you settle down with a wife;
And a seaman's thought of growin' old at his ease
Is a snug little house on the land to shelter the rest of his life.

So that was old Poisson's dream,--did you know the Cap'?
A brown little Frenchman, clever, and brave, and quick as a fish,--
Had a wife and kids on the other side of the map,--
And a rose-covered cottage for them and him was his darlin' wish.

"I 'ave sail," says he, in his broken-up Frenchy talk,
"Mos' forty-two year; I 'ave go on all part of de worl' dat ees wet.
I'm seeck of de boat and de water. I rader walk
Wid ma Josephine in one garden; an' eef we get tire', we set!

"You see dat _bateau_, _Sainte Brigitte_? I bring 'er dh'are
From de Breton coas', by gar, jus' feefteen year bifore.
She ole w'en she come on Kebec, but _Holloway Freres_
Dey buy 'er, an' hire me run 'er along dat dam' Nort' Shore.

"Dose engine one leetl' bit cranky,--too ole, you see,--
She roll and peetch in de wave'. But I lak' 'er pretty well;
An' dat sheep she lak' 'er captaine, sure, dat's me!
Wit' forty ton coal in de bunker, I tek' dat sheep t'rou' hell.

"But I don' wan' risk it no more; I had _bonne chance_:
I save already ten t'ousan' dollar', dat's plenty I s'pose!
Nex' winter I buy dat house wid de garden on France
An' I tell _adieu_ to de sea, and I leev' on de lan' in ripose."

All summer he talked of his house,--you could see the flowers
Abloom, and the pear-trees trained on the garden-wall so trim,
And the Captain awalkin' and smokin' away the hours,--
He thought he had done with the sea, but the sea hadn't done with him!

It was late in the fall when he made the last regular run,
Clear down to the Esquimault Point and back with his rickety ship;
She hammered and pounded a lot, for the storms had begun;
But he drove her,--and went for his season's pay at the end of the trip.

Now the Holloway Brothers are greedy and thin little men,
With their eyes set close together, and money's their only God;
So they told the Cap' he must run the "Bridget" again,
To fetch a cargo from Moisie, two thousand quintals of cod.

He said the season was over. They said: "Not yet.
You finish the whole of your job, old man, or you don't draw a cent!"
(They had the "Bri