The Pilot and his Wife

e portion of his wages in the material for a dress, a couple of silk handker

or eleven months after leaving Arendal, they were on a voyage from Memel in the Baltic to New York, with a cargo of timber, pla

tions to which young sailor lads are exposed during the years of their novitiate, and with a break-neck recklessness of disposition he combined such a perfectly cat-like activity, that his superior smartness was recognised even among his comrades. His bearing, it is true, was rather arrogant, and his tongue not the most good-natured; but he was generally liked nevertheless, for he was ki

ed into a field of drift-ice, with the prospect of having to remain where they were for weeks perhaps. The cold had been unusually severe that winter in the Baltic, and out over the plain of ice by which they

ut on clear days from the maintop-gallant mast-head, and which of course would be the coast of Norway. The dress, the silk handkerchiefs, the rings, and what he should say to Elizabeth-whether he should formally request a private interview with her, or wait till an opportunity offered-were running incessantly in his head. And particularly what he should say to her seemed now,

ing on the Norwegian coast. The ice too had for a day or two previously begun to show blue patche

crew who were on duty slopped up and down on the deck-cargo below, in sea-boots and dripping oilskins, or sheltered themselves, as best they could, under the lee of the round-house or forecastle. They

inter night a veritable David's choice. The strong southerly current, aided by the gale, was fast carrying him in under the Norwegian coast; while on the other hand, if he tried to beat to windward, he risked coming into collision with the ice-floes. Adde

her hea

ir; she'll la

upon his forehead under his fur cap, which, in spite of the rain, he

ked of the latter, who came up the steps

n the flying jib-boom, we should see that fa

the rather scor

n, as the other turned away, "that the lead will give you de

d to be; but still, in the hope that the wind might carry the

not to end upon the rocks that night, they must crowd on

ght be heard occasionally "halimen-oh!-oh hoi!" as the sailors worked at the tough and heavy sail, with the cordage all stiff and swollen with ice and slippery with

cannon-shot, and she had fallen away into the trough of the sea. The mainstay-sail sheet parted at the same time, and a deluge of water carried overboard, with part of the bulwarks, a lar

is a good sailor enough, a little broken-backed from the weight of the cargo amidships; and as she gave to the strain, the ladder that stood in the hold began to saw up and down in the coaming forward, while the water came

ous words of command all through the night every time they lay over upon a new tack, while at the

on, they had been encouraged to hope that they had appreciably increased their distance from the coast. About noon they passed an English brig that had been through the same struggle as the Juno was now engaged upon, whose signals of distress they had already occasionally heard fa

ard of the fore-rigging the white crest of a tremendous eddy wave, which a moment after came crashing down upon the deck, carrying clean away the round-house, binnacle, and long-boat,

from forward, and all in that direction see

once more, the renewed shrieking in every kind of pitch in the rigging, and

a moment the glimmer of two lights on its crest, and a world of associations was at once aroused in his mind: it seemed to the lad's romantic fancy that he was keeping an appointment with Elizabeth Raklev. As he glanced hurriedly back, the t

same time over the sloping deck with the help of a rope. "If they a

er under Torungen from childhood as well as he did his father's garden; and the upsho

o young shoulders," said he; "and see you think twic

they could carry in the tremendous sea that was now breaking in

de. But all of a sudden great beads of perspiration came out on his forehead. There was something curiously irregular about the light. It had become dim and

heavy a countenance as that with which Beck, whose expression discovered a trace of doubt

atever might have been the cause of its obscuration-and that