2i6 IN THE GREEN LEAF 



a fowler was a good swimmer, surely, if the 

 worst came, he could swim ashore on the tide. 

 He might do this if the set of the inshore cur- 

 rent did not exist ; but it does, a belt of it a 

 quarter of a mile in width ; and this rushes 

 and whirls at terrific speed along the shore- 

 line, finally turning out to sea, banking up the 

 sand-bar with its silt. 



The strongest swimmer in that set of the 

 tide would be washed away like a feather from 

 a gull. Even seals and fish avoid these tide- 

 races as much as possible. I have watched 

 small fishing-craft for hours, under certain tidal 

 influences, feeling their way up the tortuous 

 channels ; to all appearance it is open water, 

 but a deviation on either side of little more 

 than six feet meant grounding and the loss of 

 the catch. Hideous death-traps they look when 

 the tide is out, and that is just what they really 

 are ; like steep railway-cuttings, with water at 

 the bottom in place of rails. I have been down 

 some of them in a boat, and swum over others. 

 But sometimes sharks have been captured there. 

 They had followed the teeming shoals of various 

 fish ; one followed a shoal up a narrow creek 

 and got stranded. If you would know what 

 manner of a sea-monster can visit our shores, 



