DAYS STOLEN FOR SPORT 123 



night of semi -torture, in a cramped position in a 

 crowded third, reheved though it was by language 

 that was sometimes funny and always strange. 



The captain of the Shag is a short, round man, 

 full of flesh and permeated with himiour, and, when 

 he laughs, he laughs all over. He is to be forgiven 

 somewhat for his lengthened laughter for he is minus 

 the advantage that most men have of being able to 

 bend forward and hold their sides to ease up a bit. 

 He can hold his sides, it's true, but he cannot bend 

 forward half enough; he is too round for that. The 

 PljTTiouth sailor who smote at the Cockney with his 

 kit-bag started the shaking, and the St Austell porter 

 gave it such a further impetus that it did not subside 

 for a period so lengthened that we had grown uneasy 

 long before it ceased. At last^ame relief and the words, 

 'Bravo, St Austell.' But his merriment was not yet 

 over, for he smacked his knee many a time before 

 we reached the little bay of Porthoustock, where our 

 relatives were gathered to welcome us. 



Sixteen, all told, is a bunch to provide sport and 

 pleasure for in a village so remote from the world's 

 excitements as the one we had selected. Nigger 

 minstrels, or even a solitary organ grinder, were little 

 likely to find the way to the few cottages that provide 

 homes for the fisher folks and farm hands and look out 

 from a slight indentation in the rocky coast to the 

 dread ^lanacles — those awful rocks — that have often 

 filled their little bay with wreckage and, more than 

 once, their homes with dead. There is a lifeboat there, 

 but 'Who will man it?' is the question that may occur 

 to strangers. Gathered near the house that shelters 

 it you might see three fisher-looking men, one of whom 

 is the coxswain; you would not suspect it; his comrades 

 have no particularly heroic look, and the remainder of 

 the crew will come from plough or barn when the gun 

 is fired that all Cornish men know is a call for help. 



On a high hill about a mile away stands St Keverne, 



