THE ROBBERIES OF THE SEA 



A FURIOUS east wind drives along the coast, but 

 under the lee of a sandstone cliff we are in a garden 

 of bliss, the warm sun pouring on us from a sapphire 

 sky, and scarcely a trace of the cold wind reaching 

 us. Even the spring flowers are still blooming (or 

 already blooming) in this notch, where the wind-shorn 

 blackthorns make walls almost as impermeable as the 

 red brick that surrounds a favoured garden. We 

 have just had sight of a primrose open in its rosette 

 of leaves, and by its side the rolled bud of its successor, 

 while in several corners of the thicket the full pink 

 of the campion gladdens the eye and the heart. 

 But here we sit facing the sea, its waters now piled 

 at the high-tide mark. They are the colour of lead 

 with the charge they have taken from the blue clay 

 that prevails lower, and now the leaping, rolling, 

 lapping, smashing, backwashing waves are attacking 

 the grass banks and the tough roots with which the 

 gorse attempts to keep them for the kingdom of air. A 

 piece of the bank that has fallen into the closer grip 

 of the waves weighs probably half a ton, and seems 

 toughly woven into one by the roots. The first wave 

 lifts it tantalisingly towards the shore, but drags it 

 down again amid the rattling pebbles. Another falls 

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