With his betters to compete!

But a simple Breton sailor pressed by Tourville for the fleet,

A poor coasting-pilot he, Hervé Riel the Croisickese.

And, "What mockery or malice have we here?" cries Hervé Riel:

"Are you mad, you Malouins? Are you cowards, fools,

or rogues?

Talk to me of rocks and shoals, me who took the soundings, tell

On my fingers every bank, every shallow, every swell

'Twixt the offing here and Grève where the river disembogues?

Are you bought by English gold? Is it love the lying's for? Morn and eve, night and day,

Have I piloted your bay,

Entered free and anchored fast at the foot of Solidor.

Burn the fleet and ruin France? That were worse than fifty Hogues!

Sirs, they know I speak the truth! Sirs, believe me there's a way!

Only let me lead the line,

Have the biggest ship to steer,

Get this Formidable clear,

Make the others follow mine,

And I lead them, most and least, by a passage I know well,

Right to Solidor past Grève,

And there lay them safe and sound;

And if one ship misbehave,

- Keel so much as grate the ground,

Why, I've nothing but my life,

Hervé Riel.

Not a minute more to wait.

"Steer us in then, small and great!

here's my head!" cries

Take the helm, lead the line, save the squadron!" cried

its chief.

Captains, give the sailor place!

He is Admiral, in brief.

Still the north-wind, by God's grace!

See the noble fellow's face

As the big ship, with a bound,

Clears the entry like a hound,

Keeps the passage as its inch of way were the wide sea's profound!

See, safe thro' shoal and rock,

How they follow in a flock,

Not a ship that misbehaves, not a keel that grates the

ground,

Not a spar that comes to grief!

The peril, see, is past,

All are harbored to the last,

And just as Hervé Riel hollas "Anchor!"

sure as fate,

So, the storm subsides to calm:
They see the green trees wave

On the heights o'erlooking Grève.

Hearts that bled are stanched with balm.

"Just our rapture to enhance,

Let the English rake the bay,

Gnash their teeth and glare askance

As they cannonade away!

'Neath rampired Solidor pleasant riding on the Rance!" How hope succeeds despair on each Captain's countenance! Out burst all with one accord,

"This is Paradise for Hell!

Let France, let France's King

Thank the man that did the thing!"

What a shout, and all one word,

"Hervé Riel!"

As he stepped in front once more,
Not a symptom of surprise
In the frank blue Breton eyes,
Just the same man as before.

Then said Damfreville, "My friend,
I must speak out at the end,
Though I find the speaking hard.
Praise is deeper than the lips:
You have saved the King his ships,

You must name your own reward. 'Faith our sun was near eclipse! Demand whate'er you will,

France remains your debtor still.

Ask to heart's content and have! or my name's not Damfreville."

Then a beam of fun outbroke

On the bearded mouth that spoke,

As the honest heart laughed through
Those frank eyes of Breton blue:

"Since I needs must say my say,

Since on board the duty's done,

And from Malo Roads to Croisic Point, what is it but a run?

Since 't is ask and have, I may

Since the others go ashore

Come! A good whole holiday!

Leave to go and see my wife, whom I call the Belle Aurore!"

That he asked and that he got, nothing more.

Name and deed alike are lost:

Not a pillar nor a post

In his Croisic keeps alive the feat as it befell; Not a head in white and black

On a single fishing smack,

In memory of the man but for whom had gone to wrack All that France saved from the fight whence England bore the bell.

Go to Paris: rank on rank

Search the heroes flung pell-mell

On the Louvre, face and flank!

You shall look long enough ere you come to Hervé Riel. So, for better and for worse,

Hervé Riel, accept my verse!

In my verse, Hervé Riel, do thou once more

Save the squadron, honor France, love thy wife the Belle

Aurore!

- Robert Browning

DEAD MEN TELL NO TALES

They say that dead men tell no tales!

Except of barges with red sails,
And sailors mad for nightingales;

Except of jongleurs stretched at ease
Beside old highways through the trees;

Except of dying moons that break
The hearts of lads who lie awake;

Except of fortresses in shade,

And heroes crumbled and betrayed.

But dead men tell no tales, they say!

Except old tales that burn away
The stifling tapestries of day:

Old tales of life, of love and hate,

Of time and space, and will and fate.

-Haniel Long

DERELICT

(A REMINISCENCE OF R. L. s.'s Treasure Island and cap'n billy JONES, HIS SONG)

"Fifteen men on the dead man's chest

"Yo-ho-ho and a bottle of rum!

"Drink and the devil had done for the rest

"Yo-ho-ho and a bottle of rum!"