56 THE LIFE STORY OF AN OTTER 



port, and every one of the varied sounds that 

 reached them was a cause for fresh anxiety. To 

 the ceaseless pacing to and fro of hobbler and 

 pilot there was soon added the shout of the fish- 

 hawker, the bell of the town-crier, and other 

 sounds of trade, varied towards noon by the 

 squeakings of Punch and Judy, the yelping of 

 Toby, and the roars of laughter that punctuated 

 their performance — a strange hullabaloo indeed 

 for the shy wildlings that had been reared in the 

 quiet of the desolate moorland, where only the 

 calls of bird and beast reached them ; and many 

 a time through the trying hours they longed to be 

 back in the morass, under the cairn, or in the 

 cave now so far back on the trail. Welcome at 

 last to their eyes were the dying rays that fired 

 the windows of the cottages across the harbour ; 

 doubly welcome the departure of the last fisher- 

 man from the quay-head. His footsteps had 

 scarcely died away when the otters slid down the 

 face of the wall into the water and, threading 

 the moorings of the boats above them, rose to 

 the surface in the fairway. Three dark spots 

 that to the man leaning over the side of the 

 brigantine might well have seemed three corks, 

 showed where the otters swam noiselessly towards 

 the harbour-mouth. 



