Strip off your coat, and draw up to the fire, can't ye? Where are you
bound, then, and the night as dark as a wolf's throat?"

The young fisherman made no answer, unless by a motion of his hand. As
he turned back the collar from his face, we saw by the waving light
that it was pale as death. The long wet locks already lay upon his
cheeks, making them more ghastly as he struggled to speak. "O Stephen
Lee, it's no time to be sitting by the fire, when old Asa Osborn is
rolling in the waters. A man's drownded; and who's to get the body for
the wife and the children--God pity them!--afore the ebb carries it
out to sea?"

The old man drew his hand across his forehead, and rose. I looked at
him as he drew up his tall figure, and looked the young messenger full
in the eye. In a low, deep whisper, he said, "Who, William, did ye
say? You said a man's drownded,--but tell me the name again."

"Yes, Gran'sir, I did say it. Old Uncle Ase Flemming, he and the
minister went out a fishing in the morning. The minister got his boots
off in the water, and after a long time he's swum ashore. But poor
Uncle Ase--. Stephen, come along. His poor wife's gone down to the
beach, now."

They left the house, and I shut the door after them, and came back
softly to my seat by the old man's knee.

Once before I had seen him, when a heavy sorrow fell upon him. It was
on a beautiful summer's day, and the open window let in the cool
breeze from the sea. He was sitting by it in his arm-chair, looking
out upon the calm water, buried in thought. His favorite daughter had