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Luella Clark

North Sea Fishers.

HE fisherman's toil begins in the evening, just when the sun is descending the western slopes.

Then all the little harbor is astir. The mouth of the harbor is so narrow that only one boat can put out at a time; but on board a dozen or more, there has been a simultaneous commencement of active labor. After half an hour or so of preparation, boathooks are dipped into the water, the first boat swings round the corner of the pier, the sail is slowly hoisted, and with what seems like a joyous bound the Welcome Home leaps out over the ground-swell and makes toward the eastern skies. As for the women-folk, their day's work is over; and they stand watching on the narrow quay. Boat follows boat over the purpling waters, until you see nothing but a crowd of yellow sails on the horizon, dipping slowly down-slowly down and away-into the thickening haze.

On such quiet nights as this the fisherman's occupation seems safe and agreeable and pleasurably exciting; but the North Sea is treacherous, and subject to sudden storms. Sitting on the hillside at Burnmouth I have watched the boats put off on a gray evening, when they were soon hidden by the thick, damp, clinging mist. Under its spectral covering the sea was heaving calmly enough, and you heard the ground-swell breaking with a quiet, even, murmurous sound against the pier. An hour or so, and there was a quickening in these watery pulsations; the sky became more heavily overcast; the sea broke far out; and long, creeping waves came chasing each other into the little bay. Then an old fisherman lumbered out and peered through the mist, and by and by the women joined him. How about those who had just put forth to sea? The coast is dangerous and cruel.

When the tide is out you may look on row upon row of jagged reefs, set like sharks' teeth, and brown with clinging sea-weed. Once out, the boats must either bide the full fury of the rising storm, or make straight for the harbor before it breaks upon them in its force. On nights like this, when the sky is hidden with mist, and the wind comes in sudden gusts, and the waves break with ever-increasing fury against the pier, hearts beat anxiously, and there is a dread silence amongst the women-folk who are waiting for the return of the boats. A general sigh of relief is audible as a dark shadow comes bounding forward, and a sail is suddenly lowered, and a boat swings round into the harbor, with its crew safe on board. They are coming back, then?

There will be no fishing to-night, nor will any woman lie sleepless, thinking of the dangers of "her man," far out amid the wild waters and the relentless gale.