James Runciman - The Romance of the Coast

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THE ROMANCE OF THE COAST.

by

JAMES RUNCIMAN.

[Illustration]

London: George Bell and Sons,
York Street, Covent Garden.
Chiswick Press:--C. Whittingham and Co., Tooks Court,
Chancery Lane.

1883.

To FREDERICK GREENWOOD,

THE EDITOR OF THE _James's Gazette._

DEAR SIR,

I dedicate this little book to you. When you first gave me the chance of
escaping from the unkindly work of political journalism, I used to think
that your treatment of efforts which I thought extremely fine, was
somewhat heartless. I am glad now that I have passed under your severe
discipline, and I am proud to be one of the school of writers whose
professional success is due to your help and training.

I am, Dear Sir,

Yours very faithfully,

JAMES RUNCIMAN.

CONTENTS.

PAGE

AN OLD-SCHOOL PILOT 1

AN UGLY CONTRAST 6

THE FISHERWOMAN 11

THE VETERAN 16

THE HEROINE OF A FISHING VILLAGE 22

THE SILENT MEN 27

THE CABIN-BOY 33

THE SQUIRE 40

THE VILLAGE PREACHER 47

THE FISHER'S FRIEND 52

THE COASTGUARD 57

THE SUSPECTED MAN 63

THE RABBIT-CATCHER 68

THE GIANTS 79

THE COLLIER SKIPPER 85

IN THE BAY 90

THE SIBYL 96

A VOLUNTEER LIFE-BRIGADE 102

KEELMEN 107

BLOWN NORTH 113

NORTH-COUNTRY FISHERMEN 118

A LONG CHASE 126

HOB'S TOMMY 131

THE FAILURE 151

MR. CASELY 169

THE ROMANCE OF THE COAST.

AN OLD-SCHOOL PILOT.

At the mouth of a north-country river a colony of pilots dwelt. The men
and women of this colony looked differently and spoke a dialect
different from that used by the country people only half a mile off. The
names, too, of the pilot community were different from those of the
surrounding population. Tully was the most common surname of all, and
the great number of people who bore it were mostly black-eyed and
dark-haired, quite unlike our fair and blue-eyed north-country folk.
Antiquaries say the Romans must have lived on the spot for at least two
hundred years, judging by the coins and the vast quantities of household
materials unearthed; and so some persons have no difficulty in
accounting for the peculiarities of the pilot colony. Speculations of
this sort are, however, somewhat beside the mark. It is only certain
that the pilots lived amongst themselves, intermarried, and kept their
habits and dialect quite distinct. When a pilot crossed the line a
hundred yards west of his house, he met people who knew him by his
tongue to be a "foreigner."

My particular friend among the pilots was a very big man, who used, to
amuse us much by the childish gravity of his remarks. He was a remnant
of a past generation, and the introduction of steam shocked his
faculties beyond recovery. He would say: "In the old times, sir, vessels
had to turn up here. It was back, fill, and shiver-r-r all the way; but
now you might as well have sets of rails laid on the water and run the
ships on them. There is no seamanship needed." He never quite forgave
the Commissioners for deepening the river. As he said in his trenchant
manner: "There used to be some credit in bringing a ship across the bar
when you were never quite sure whether she would touch or not; but now
you could bring the 'Duke of Wellington' in at low water. These
kid-gloved captains come right up to their moorings as safe as if they
were driving a coach along the road." He was quite intolerant of
railways, too; but then his first experience of the locomotive engine
was not pleasant. Somehow he got on to the railway line on a hazy night;
and just as the train had slowed down to enter the station the engine
struck him and knocked him over. The engine-driver became aware of a
brief burst of strong language, and in great alarm called upon two
porters to walk along the line to see what had happened. They did so of
course, and when they got to the place of the accident the light of
their lanterns revealed the pilot perfectly sound and engaged in
brushing dirt off his clothes. When he saw the bright buttons of the
railway officials the thought of the police came instantly into his
mind, and he said, "Here, now, you needn't be taking me up; if I've done
any damage to your engine I'll pay for it." At another time he was
bringing a ship northwards when he was invited by the captain to run
down below and help himself to a nip of brandy. After taking his brandy
he proceeded to light his pipe at the stove. Now the captain possessed a
large monkey, and the creature was shivering near the fire. The pilot
said, "A gurly day, sir;" and the monkey gave a responsive shiver. Tho
pilot went on with affable gruffness, "The Soutar light's away on the
port bow now, sir;" and still the monkey made no answer. Not to be
stalled off, the pilot proceeded, "We'll be over the bar in an hour,
sir." But failing to elicit a response even to this pleasant
information, he stepped up on deck, and ranging himself alongside of the
captain on the bridge, said, "What a quiet chap your father is!"

The first time I saw my poor friend I liked him. We lived in a lonely
house that stood on the cliffs at a bleak turn of the coast. One wild
morning a coble beat into our cove. It looked as though the sea must
double on her every second; but just when the combers shot at her most
dangerously the man at the tiller placed the broad square stern at right
angles to the path of the travelling wave, and she lunged forward
safely. By dexterous jockeying she was brought close in, and the men
came through the shallow water in their sea-boots. They were blue with
cold, and begged for a little tea or coffee. Hot cakes and coffee
happened to be just ready; so the fellows had a hearty breakfast and
went away. With prolonged clumsiness the pilot shook the hand of the
lady who had entertained him; and in two days after the boat sailed into
the cove again amid nasty weather, and the master came ashore with a
set of gaudy wooden bowls painted black and red. These he solemnly
presented to the lady of the house. He had run thirty miles against a
northerly sea to bring them.

When I next saw the pilot he had fallen upon very hard times. The system
of keeping "privileged men" had obtained great hold in the north. The
privileged pilot does not need to go out and beat about at sea in search
of vessels; he can lie comfortably in his bed until he is signalled, and
then he steps aboard without any of the trouble of competition. However
good this system may be in a general way, it bears very hardly on the
poor fellows who have to lie off for two or three days together on the
chance of getting a ship. We were passing by Flamborough Head in a large
steamer when the mate came down below and said, "There is a pilot-boat
from our town astern there, sir." The captain shouted, "Tell them to
stop her directly and take the coble in tow." We then blew our whistle,
and the pilot-boat drew up alongside. My friend stepped aboard, and the
captain said, "Come away down and have some breakfast." The pilot tried
to speak, but his voice broke. He said: "No, I can't eat. When you
passed us, we baith started to cry; and when you whistled for us, maw
heart com' oot on its place, an' it'll gan back ne mair." The poor men
had had no food for two days. In spite of his tragic statement, the
pilot recovered, and ate a very good breakfast indeed; and his boat
towed astern of us till he placed us at our moorings.

He met his end like a brave man in the great October gale which all of
us remember. He was down on the pier smoking with his friends in the
watch-house and looking out occasionally for distressed vessels. The
great seas were hurling themselves over the stone-work and shattering
into wild wreaths of foam on the sand. Strong men who showed themselves
outside full in the face of the wind were blown down flat as if they had
been tottering children. The wind sounded as though it were blown
through a huge trumpet, and the sea was running nine feet on the bar. A
small vessel fought through, and appeared likely to get into the
fairway. She showed her port light for a time, and all seemed going
well. Suddenly she opened both her red and her green lights, and it was
seen that she was coming dead on for the pier. Presently she struck
hard, within thirty yards of the stone-work. There was wild excitement
amongst the brigade men, for they saw that she must be smashed into
matchwood in five minutes. The rockets were got ready; but before a shot
could be fired the ill-fated vessel gave way totally. A great sea rushed
along the side of the pier, and the pilot saw something black amongst
the travelling water. "There's a man!" he shouted; and without a
moment's thought plunged in, calling on the other fellows to pitch him a
rope. Had he tied a line around his waist before he jumped he would have
been all right. As it was, the Dutchman whom he tried to save was washed
clean on to the pier and put safely to bed in the brigade-house. The
pilot was not found until two days afterwards.

AN UGLY CONTRAST.

The steam-tug "Alice," laden with excursionists from several Tyneside
towns, struck in the autumn of 1882 on the Bondicar Rocks, sixteen miles
north of Blyth. The boat was not much damaged, and could easily have
been run into the Coquet River within a very few minutes if the
passengers had only kept steady. But the modern English spirit came upon
the men, and a rush was made for the boat. Women and children were
hustled aside; and the captain of the tug had to threaten certain
persons of his own sex with violence before he could keep the crowd
back. Some twenty-seven people clambered into the boat, and then a man
of genius cut away the head-rope, and flung the helpless screaming
company into the sea. Twenty-five of them were drowned. It will be a
relief if time reveals any ground of hope that the men of our
manufacturing towns will lose no more of the virtues which we used to
think a part of the English character--coolness and steadiness and
unselfishness in times of danger, for example. The Englishmen who live
in quiet places have not become cowardly, so far as is ascertained; nor
are they liable to womanish panic. In the dales and in the
fishing-villages along our north-east coast may still be found plenty
of brave men. Where such disgraceful scenes as that rush to the
"Alice's" boat are witnessed, or selfishness like that of the men who
got away in the boats of the "Northfleet," there we generally find that
the civilization of towns has proved fatal to coolness and courage.

Curiously enough, it happens that within six miles of the rock where the
"Alice" struck, a splendidly brave thing was done, which serves in
itself to illustrate the difference that is growing up between the race
that lives by the factory and the men who earn their bread out-of-doors.
Passing southward from the Bondicar Rocks you come to a shallow stream
that sprawls over the sand and ripples into the sea. You wade this
stream, and walk still southward by the side of rolling sand hills. The
wind hurls through the hollows, and the bents shine like grey armour on
the bluffs of the low heights. You are not likely to meet any one on
your way, not even a tramp. Presently the hills open, and you come to
the prettiest village on the whole coast. The green common slopes down
to the sea, and great woods rustle and look glad all round the margin of
the luxuriant grass-land. Along the cliff straggle a few stone houses,
and the square tower with its sinister arrow-holes dominates the row.
There is smooth water inshore; but half a mile or so out eastward there
runs a low range of rocks. One night a terrible storm broke on the
coast. The sea rose, and beat so furiously on the shore that the spray
flew over the Fisher Row, and yellow sea foam was blown in patches over
the fields. The waters beyond the shore were all in a white turmoil,
save where, far off, the grey clouds laid their shoulders to the sea
and threw down leaden shadows. Most of the ships had gone south about;
but one little brig got stuck hard-and-fast on the ledge of rocks that
runs below the village. She had eight men aboard of her, and these had
to take to the rigging; where the people on shore heard them shouting.
It is a fearful kind of noise, the crying of men in a wrecked ship.
Morning broke, and the weather was wilder than ever. There was no
lifeboat in the place, and it was plain that the vessel could not stand
the rage of the breakers much longer. It was hard to see the ship at
all, the spray came in so thickly. The women were crying and wringing
their hands on the bank; but that was of small avail. However, one
little trouting-boat lay handy, and her owner determined to go off in
her to the brig. He was a fine fellow to look at--quite a remarkable
specimen of a man, indeed. Without any flurry, without a sign of emotion
on his face, he said, "Who's coming?" His two sons stepped out, and the
boat was moved towards the water's edge.

Just then a carter came down to look at the wreck. The carter's mare was
terror-stricken by the wrath of the sea, and galloped down the beach. In
passing the coble the mare plunged, and the axle-tree of the cart staved
in the head of the boat below the water-line. This was very bad; but the
leader of the forlorn hope did not give himself time to waver. Taking
off his coat, he stuffed it into the hole; and then, calling in another
volunteer, he said, "Sit against that." The men took their places very
coolly, and the little boat was thrust out amid the broken water. Amidst
all this the face of one woman who stood looking at the men arrested my
attention. It was very white, and her eyes had a look in them that I
cannot describe, though I have seen it since in my sleep. The men in the
boat were her husband and her sons. She said nothing, but kept her hands
tightly clasped; and her lips parted every time the boat rose on the
crown of a wave. We could not see those good fellows half the time: all
we could tell was that the man who was sitting against the jacket had to
bale very hard. Presently the deep bow of the boat rose over a
travelling sea, and she ground on the sand. She was heavily laden with
the brig's crew of limp and shivering Danish seamen. And it was not a
moment too soon for her to be ashore: the brig parted almost directly,
and the wreckage was strewn all along the beach.

The men who did this action never had any reward. And it did not matter;
for they took a very moderate view of their own merits. They knew, of
course, that they had done a good morning's work; but it never occurred
to them that they ought to have a paragraph in the newspapers and be
called brave. The sort of courage they exhibited they would have
described, if their attention had been called to it, as "only natural."
The old hero who went through a heavy sea with a staved-in boat is still
living. His name is Big Tom, and his home is at Cresswell, in the county
of Northumberland. He does not know that he is at all heroic; but it is
pleasant to think of him after reading about those wretched
excursionists who drowned each other in sheer fright within sight of his
home. He has often saved life since then. But when he puts out to sea
now he does not need to use a stove-in coble: he is captain of the
smart lifeboat; and his proudest possession is a photograph which shows
his noble figure standing at the bow.

THE FISHERWOMAN.

On bleak mornings you might see the movements of Peggy's stooping figure
among the glistening brown weeds that draped the low rocks; and somehow
you always noticed her most on bleak mornings. When the joy of the
summer was in the air, and the larks were singing high up in the sky, it
seemed rather pleasant than otherwise to paddle about among the quiet
pools and on the cold bladder-wrack. But when the sky was leaden, and
the wind rolled with strange sounds down the chill hollows, it was
rather pitiful to see a barefooted woman tramping in those bitter
places. The sea seemed to wait for every fresh lash of the blast; and
when the grey water sprang into brief spurts of spray you felt how
cruelly Peggy's bare limbs were cut by the wind. But she took it all
kindly, and made no moan about anything. Towards eight o'clock you would
meet her tramping over the sand with her great creel full of bait slung
on her forehead. Her feet gripped at the sand, and her strong leg looked
ruddy and hard. Her hands were always rough, and covered with little
scratches received while she baited the lines; but these were no
miseries to Peggy, and her face always seemed composed and quiet. She
would not pass you without a word, and her voice was pleasant with low
gutturals. If her eyes reminded you of the sea, you put it down to a
natural fancy. They were not at all poetic or sentimental; for Peggy was
a rough woman. But something there was in the gleam of her pale clear
eyes that made you think of the far northern seas, by the borders of
which her forefathers in a remote time were probably born. As I have
said, Peggy could use very rough words when farmers' wives tired her
with too much chaffering; but mostly her face had a hard placidity that
refreshed the mind, just as it is refreshed by considering the
deliberate ways of harmless animals.

Towards eleven in the morning Peggy would be seated in her warm kitchen,
beside a flat basket in which mysterious coils of brown twine wound
round and round. The brown twine had tied to it long lines of horse-hair
snoods with sharp white hooks lashed on by slips of waxed thread. Peggy
baited one after another of these hooks and laid them dexterously so
that the line might be shot overboard without entanglement. You might
sit down in the sanded kitchen to talk to the good woman if you were not
nice about fishy odours. If you led on to such subjects, she would bring
out her store of ghostly stories: how a dead lady walked in the
shrubberies by the tower after the squire's sons murdered her lover; and
how the old clock in the tower had a queer light travelling over its
face on one day of the year. Or she would gossip about the folks in the
place; telling you how poor Jemmy had lost money, and how old Adam had
got a rare stocking, and him meeting the priest every day like a poor
man. You might smoke as much as you liked in Peggy's kitchen; and for
various reasons it was just as well to keep smoking: the sanitary
principles of Dr. Richardson are not known in the villages on the coast.
Peggy herself did not smoke, because it was not considered right for
women to use tobacco until they were past the age of sixty-five. After
that they had their weekly allowance with the groceries. In the evenings
of bright days you saw Peggy at her best. When the dusk fell, and the
level sands shone with a deep smooth gloss, you would see strange
figures bowing with rhythmic motions. These figures were those of women.
All the women of the village turn out on the sand to hunt for sand-eels.
To catch a sand-eel requires long practice. You take two iron hooks, and
work them down deep in the sand when the tide has just gone. With quick
but steady movements, you make a series of deep "criss-crosses;" and
when the fish is disturbed by the hooks you whip him smartly out, and
put him in the basket before his magical wriggle has taken him deep into
the sand again. The women stooping over the shining floor look like
ghostly harvesters reaping invisible crops. They are very silent, and
their steps are feline. Peggy worked out her day, and then she would go
home and cut up the eels for the next day's lines. In the early morning
the men came in, and then Peggy had to turn out and carry the fish to
the cart that drove inland to the coach or the railway station. It was
not a gay life; but still each fresh day brought the lads and their
father home, and Peggy could not have looked at them, and more
especially perhaps at her great sons, without being proud of her
men-folk. While they were sleeping she had to be at work, so that the
home life was restricted, but it was abundantly clear that in a rough
and silent way the whole of the family were fond of each other; and if
Peggy could spare little more than a glance when the brown sail of the
coble came in sight, it is probable that she felt just as much as ladies
who have time for long and yearning looks.

There came a time when Peggy needed no more to look out for the sail.
Her husband went stolidly down to the boat one evening, and her three
sons followed with their weighty tread. The father was a big, rugged man
with a dark face; the lads were yellow-haired, taking after their
mother. Some of the fishermen did not like the look of the evening sky,
but Peggy's husband never much heeded the weather.

Next day the wind came away very strong, and the cobles had to cower
southward under a bare strip of mainsail. The men ashore did not like to
be asked whether they thought the weather would get worse; and the women
stood anxiously at their doors. A little later and they gathered all
together on the rock-edge. One coble, finely handled, was working
steadily up to the bend where the boats ran in for the smooth water, and
Peggy followed every yard that the little craft gained. All the world
for her depended on the chance of weathering that perilous turn. The
sail was hardly to be seen for the drift that was plucked off the crests
of the waves. Too soon Peggy saw a great roller double over and fold
itself heavily into the boat. Then there was the long wallowing lurch,
and the rudder came up, while the mast and the sodden sail went under.
It was bad enough for a woman to read in some cold official list about
the death of her father, her husband, her son; but very much worse it is
for the woman who sees her dearest drowning--standing safe ashore to
watch every hopeless struggle for life. One of the fishers said to
Peggy, "Come thy ways in, my woman; and we'll away and seek them." But
Peggy walked fast across the sand and down to the place where she knew
the set of the tide would carry the dead lads in. The father came first
ashore. She wiped the froth from his lips and closed his eyes, and then
hastened further northward where her eldest son was flung on the beach.
Peggy saw in an instant that his face was bruised, and moaned at the
sight of the bruises; his father looked as though he were sleeping. The
other lads did not come ashore till next day, and Peggy would not go
home all the night through. In the dark she got away from the kind
fellows who stayed by her; and when they sought her she was kneeling in
the hollow of a sand-hill where another of her boys lay--her face
pressed against the grass.

These bold fellows were laid in the ground, and next day Peggy started
silently to work. The grandfather--that is, her husband's father, an old
man, quite broken by the loss of his son--was brought home to his son's
fireside, where the two may be seen to-day: their thoughts divided
between their dead and the business of getting bread for to-morrow.

THE VETERAN.

In the mornings a chair used to be placed on the cliff-side facing the
sea, and towards ten o'clock a very old man would walk slowly down the
village street and take his seat. A little shelf held his pipe and
tobacco-jar, and he would sit and smoke contentedly until the afternoon.
The children used to play around him with perfect confidence, although
he seldom spoke to them. His face looked as if it were roughly carved
out of stone, and his complexion was of a deep rich brown. On his
watch-chain he wore several trinkets, and he was specially proud of one
thin disk: this was the Nile medal; for the old man had been in the
fight at Aboukir. He seldom spoke about his experience of life on board
a man-of-war; he was far more interested in bestowing appreciative
criticism on the little coasters that flitted past northward and
southward, and in saying severe things about the large screw colliers.
But although he had little to tell about his fighting experiences, he
was a hero none the less. He lived in a little white cottage at the high
end of the Green, and a woman came every morning to attend to his simple
wants; for his old wife had died long ago. He was lonely, and not much
noticed outside the village; yet he had done, in his time, one of the
finest things known in the history of bravery.

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