--my son-in-law, Daniel, bein' away with me on the
East Coast after the herrings. I'd as good as promised him to be
back in time for it--this bein' my first grandchild, an' due (so well
as we could calculate) any time between Christmas an' New Year.
Well, there was no sacrifice, as it happened, in startin' for home--
the weather up there keepin' monstrous, an' the catches not worth the
labour. So we turned down Channel, the wind strong an' dead foul--
south at first, then west-sou'-west--headin' us all the way, and
always blowin' from just where 'twasn't wanted. This lasted us down
to the Wight, and we'd most given up hope to see home before
Christmas, when almost without warnin' it catched in off the land--
pretty fresh still, but steady--and bowled us down past the Bill and
halfway across to the Start, merry as heart's delight. Then it fell
away again, almost to a flat calm, and Daniel lost his temper.
I never allowed cursin' on board the Early and Late--nor, for that
matter, on any other boat of mine; but if Daniel didn't swear a bit
out of hearin', well then--poor dear fellow, he's dead and gone these
twelve years (yes, sir--drowned)--well then I'm doin' him an
injustice. One couldn't help pitying him, neither. Didn't I know
well enough what it felt like? And the awe of it, to think it's
happenin' everywhere, and ever since world began--men fretting for
the wife and firstborn, and gettin' over it, and goin' down to the
grave leavin' the firstborn to fret over _his_ firstborn! It puts me
in mind o' the old hemn, sir: 'tis in the Wesley books, and I can't
think why church folk leave out the verse--

"The busy tribes o' flesh and blood,
With all their cares and fears--"

Ay, 'cares and fears'; that's of it--

"Are carried downward by the flood,
And lost in followin' years."

"Poor Daniel--poor boy!"

Pilot Matthey sat silent for a while, staring out over the water in
the wake of the boats that already had begun to melt into the shadow
of darkness.

"'Twas beautiful sunshiny weather, too, as I mind," he resumed. "One
o' those calm spells that happen, as often as not, just about
Christmas. I remember drawin' your attention to it, sir, one
Christmas when I passed you the compliments of the season; and you
put it down to kingfishers, which I thought strange at the time."

"Kingfishers?" echoed I, mystified for the moment. "Oh, yes"--as
light broke on me--"Halcyon days, of cour