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They took on the cargo at Moisie, and folks beside,–
Three traders, a priest, and a couple of nuns, and a girl
For a school at Quebec,–when the Captain saw her he sighed,
And said: “Ma littl’ Fifi got hair lak’ dat, all curl!”

The snow had fallen a foot, and the wind was high,
When the “Bridget” butted her way thro’ the billows on Moisie bar.
The darkness grew with the gale, not a star in the sky,
And the Captain swore: “We mus’ make Sept Isles to-night, by gar!”

He couldn’t go back, for he didn’t dare to turn;
The sea would have thrown the ship like a mustang noosed with a rope;
For the monstrous waves were leapin’ high astern,
And the shelter of Seven Island Bay was the only hope.

There’s a bunch of broken hills half sunk in the mouth
Of the bay, with their jagged peaks afoam; and the Captain thought
He could pass to the north; but the sea kept shovin’ him south,
With her harlot hands, in the snow-blind murk, till she had him caught.

She had waited forty years for a night like this,–
Did he think he could leave her now, and live in a cottage, the fool?
She headed him straight for the island he couldn’t miss;
And heaved his boat in the dark,–and smashed it against Gran’ Boule.

How the Captain and half of the people clambered ashore,
Through the surf and the snow in the gloom of that horrible night,
There’s no one ever will know. For two days more
The death-white shroud of the tempest covered the island from sight.

How they suffered, and struggled, and died, will never be told;
We discovered them all at last when we reached Gran’ Boule with a boat;
The drowned and the frozen were lyin’ stiff and cold,
And the poor little girl with the curls was wrapped in the Captain’s
coat.

Go write your song of the sea as the landsmen do,
And call her your “great sweet mother,” your “bride,” and all the rest;
She was made to be loved,–but remember, she won’t love you,–
The men who trust her the least are the sailors who know her the best.