THE MASTER OF THE ISLES
There is rumor in Dark Harbor,
And the folk are all astir;
For a stranger in the offing
Draws them down to gaze at her,
In the gray of early morning,
Black against the orange streak,
Making in below the ledges,
With no colors at her peak.
Something makes their hearts uneasy
As they watch the long black hull,
For she brings the storm behind her
While before her there is lull.
With no pilot and unspoken,
Where the dancing breakers are,
Presently she veers and races
In across the roaring bar,--
Rounds and luffs and comes to anchor,
While the wharf begins to throng.
Silence falls upon the women.
And misgiving stirs the strong.
Then with some obscure foreboding,
As a gray-haired watcher smiles,
They perceive the fearless captain
Is the Master of the Isles.
They recall the bleak December
Many streaming years ago,
When the stranger had been sighted
Driving shoreward with the snow;
When the Master came among them
With his calm and courtly pride,
And had sailed away at sundown
With pale Dora for his bride;
How again he came one summer
When the herring schools were late,
And had cleared before the morning
With old Alec's son for mate.
There was glamour with the Master;
He had tales of far-off seas;
But his habit and demeanor
Were of other lands than these.
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