By the Morning Boat

"By the Morning Boat" is a poignant novella by Sarah Orne Jewett that explores themes of love, longing, and connection within the coastal setting of New England. The story follows the life of a young woman as she navigates her emotions and relationships while reflecting on the passage of time and the choices that shape her destiny. Jewett’s exquisite prose paints a vivid picture of the natural landscape and captures the subtleties of human experience, making it a rich exploration of personal growth and the bonds that tie individuals to their communities.

• Short story

								
On the coast of Maine, where many green islands and salt inlets fringe
the deep-cut shore line; where balsam firs and bayberry bushes send
their fragrance far seaward, and song-sparrows sing all day, and the
tide runs plashing in and out among the weedy ledges; where cowbells
tinkle on the hills and herons stand in the shady coves,--on the
lonely coast of Maine stood a small gray house facing the morning
light. All the weather-beaten houses of that region face the sea
apprehensively, like the women who live in them.

This home of four people was as bleached and gray with wind and rain
as one of the pasture rocks close by. There were some cinnamon rose
bushes under the window at one side of the door, and a stunted lilac
at the other side. It was so early in the cool morning that nobody was
astir but some shy birds, that had come in the stillness of dawn to
pick and flutter in the short grass.

They flew away together as some one softly opened the unlocked door
and stepped out. This was a bent old man, who shaded his eyes with his
hand, and looked at the west and the east and overhead, and then took
a few lame and feeble steps farther out to see a wooden vane on the
barn. Then he sat down on the doorstep, clasped his hands together
between his knees, and looked steadily out to sea, scanning the
horizon where some schooners had held on their course all night, with
a light westerly breeze. He seemed to be satisfied at sight of the
weather, as if he had been anxious, as he lay unassured in his north
bedroom, vexed with the sleeplessness of age and excited by thoughts
of the coming day. The old seaman dozed as he sat on the doorstep,
while dawn came up and the world grew bright; and the little birds
returned, fearfully at first, to finish their breakfast, and at last
made bold to hop close to his feet.

After a time some one else came and stood in the open door behind him.

"Why, father! seems to me you've got an early start; 't ain't but four
o'clock. I thought I was foolish to get up so soon, but 't wa'n't so I
could sleep."

"No, darter." The old man smiled as he turned to look at her, wide
awake on the instant. "'T ain't so soon as I git out some o' these
'arly mornin's. The birds wake me up singin', and it's plenty light,
you know. I wanted to make sure 'Lisha would have a fair day to go."

"I expect he'd have to go if the weather wa'n't good," said the woman.

"Yes, yes, but 'tis useful to have fair weather, an' a good sign some
says it is. This is a great event for the boy, ain't it?"

"I can't face the thought o' losin' on him, father." The woman came
forward a step or two and sat down on the doorstep. She was a
hard-worked, anxious creature, whose face had lost all look of youth.
She was apt, in the general course of things, to hurry the old man and
to spare little time for talking, and he was pleased by this
acknowledged unity of their interests. He moved aside a little to give
her more room, and glanced at her with a smile, as if to beg her to
speak freely. They were both undemonstrative, taciturn New Englanders;
their hearts were warm with pent-up feeling, that summer morning, yet
it was easier to understand one another through silence than through
speech.

"No, I couldn't git much sleep," repeated the daughter at last. "Some
things I thought of that ain't come to mind before for years,--things
I don't relish the feelin' of, all over again."

"'T was just such a mornin' as this, pore little 'Lisha's father went
off on that last v'y'ge o' his," answered the old sailor, with instant
comprehension. "Yes, you've had it master hard, pore gal, ain't you? I
advised him against goin' off on that old vessel with a crew that
wa'n't capable."

"Such a mornin' as this, when I come out at sun-up, I always seem to
see her top-s'ils over there beyond the p'int, where she was to
anchor. Well, I thank Heaven 'Lisha was averse to goin' to sea,"
declared the mother.

"There's dangers ashore, Lucy Ann," said the grandfather, solemnly;
but there was no answer, and they sat there in silence until the old
man grew drowsy again.

"Yisterday was the first time it fell onto my heart that 'Lisha was
goin' off," the mother began again, after a time had passed. "P'r'aps
folks was right about our needing of him. I've been workin' every way
I could to further him and git him a real good chance up to Boston,
and now that we've got to part with him I don't see how to put up with
it."

"All nateral," insisted the old man. "My mother wept the night through
before I was goin' to sail on my first v'y'ge; she was kind of
satisfied, though, when I come home next summer, grown a full man,
with my savin's in my pocket, an' I had a master pretty little figured
shawl I'd bought for her to Bristol."

"I don't want no shawls. Partin' is partin' to me," said the woman.

"'T ain't everybody can stand in her fore-door an' see the chimbleys
o' three child'n's houses without a glass," he tried eagerly to
console her. "All ready an' willin' to do their part for you, so as
you could let 'Lisha go off and have his chance."

"I don't know how it is," she answered, "but none on 'em never give me
the rooted home feelin' that 'Lisha has. They was more varyin' and
kind o' fast growin' and scatterin'; but 'Lisha was always 'Lisha when
he was a babe, and I settled on him for the one to keep with me."

"Then he's just the kind to send off, one you ain't got to worry
about. They're all good child'n," said the man. "We've reason to be
thankful none on 'em's been like some young sprigs, more grief 'n
glory to their folks. An' I ain't regrettin' 'Lisha's goin' one mite;
I believe you'd rather go on doin' for him an' cossetin'. I think 't
was high time to shove him out o' the nest."

"You ain't his mother," said Lucy Ann.

"What be you goin' to give him for his breakfast?" asked the stern
grandfather, in a softened, less business-like voice.

"I don't know's I'd thought about it, special, sir. I did lay aside
that piece o' apple pie we had left yisterday from dinner," she
confessed.

"Fry him out a nice little crisp piece o' pork, Lucy Ann, an' 't will
relish with his baked potatoes. He'll think o' his breakfast more
times 'n you expect. I know a lad's feelin's when home's put behind
him."

The sun was up clear and bright over the broad sea inlet to the
eastward, but the shining water struck the eye by its look of vacancy.
It was broad daylight, and still so early that no sails came stealing
out from the farmhouse landings, or even from the gray groups of
battered fish-houses that overhung, here and there, a sheltered cove.
Some crows and gulls were busy in the air; it was the time of day when
the world belongs more to birds than to men.

"Poor 'Lisha!" the mother went on compassionately. "I expect it has

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