Once a Week (magazine)/Series 1/Volume 8/The Bay of the Dead
THE BAY OF THE DEAD.
AN ARMORICAN LEGEND.
Wedded to-day is one who dwells
A Breton bay beside;
His soul belongs to the Evil One,
Pity the tender bride!
“Say, husband, where be those tales of woe,
Those ghosts which shiver and roam,
With which you frighten’d me once and again,
Before I left my home?”
“Hush, wife! not a word! I hold my lands
Of the Frankish conquerors free,
So long as I’m ready to row their dead
To the sepulchre over the sea.”
“They come not to-night!” she laughed in glee,
“The witch-lights are flitting past;
They will fear the waves and the thunder’s roll
And the rain which falleth fast.”
“That low soft knock—’tis a summons for me!
They wait—nay, cease thy sorrow;
On Cornwall’s coast I must land them to-night,
Or I dare not face the morrow!”
“Ah! stay this night—but once I pray!”
“I may not linger, sweet!”
One kiss, and he speeds to the gusty shore,
But the spirits are far more fleet.
Afloat is his skiff, to her gunwale sunk
(Though empty to mortal sight);
He hoists her sail to the furious gale,
And drifts into blackest night.
Strange shrieks, deep groans from the boat resound—
The ghosts who have died to day—
Babes, women, and men—they wail as they sail
From their loved ones far away.
In an hour they land on the Cornish strand;
Lightly now (see the boat’s keel shows!),
Lightly the swift sea-horses bear
Him home o’er the crested snows.
Speeds to his arms at the shore his bride,
Winged by love, so young and so fair;
She slips and the long black sea-weeds twine
And stream ’midst her golden hair.
Then rises the Evil One seeking his prey,
Drags him back from the Breton shore;
Unshriven, unhouselled, the ghosts may roam,
But his skiff comes nevermore!
All night they flit by Cornuaille’s beach
(You may hear them moan o’erhead);
The peasants still cross their breasts, and call
That bay the Bay of the Dead.