Chapter VI

And "What mockery or malice have we here?" cries Hervé Riel; 45
"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 smell
'Twixt the offing here and Grève where the river disembogues?
Are you bought by English gold? Is it love the lying's for? 50
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 55
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, 60
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;--here's my head!" cries Hervé 65
Riel.

VII

Not a minute more to wait.
"Steer us in, then, small and great!
Take the helm, lead the line, save the squadron!" cried its chief.
Captains, give the sailor place!
He is Admiral, in brief. 70
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 75
profound!
See, safe through 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. 80
All are harbored to the last,
And just as Hervé Riel hollas, "Anchor!"--sure as fate
Up the English come--too late!