THE GREAT BLACK-BACKED GULL. 183 



It had been a beautiful day on one of the loneliest 

 parts of our lonely foreshore. After the heat of the 

 sun had left the pebbly beach, a slight breeze had 

 sprung up, just strong enough to stir the sand 

 on the hillocks, and to cover up the prints of the 

 dotterels' feet and the traces of the lizards that 

 had revelled in the warmth and been running about 

 all the day long. The tide was coming in, and the 

 gulls beat lazily to and fro, looking for what it 

 might cast before it. Curlews were busy with their 

 sickle-like bills, trying to get a meal before the water 

 reached them. These, with a few dotterels that 

 piped as they ran, were all that was to be seen in 

 the way of bird-life. 



Our community of fisher-folk was moved to the 

 core. The wildest and most daring of the sea- 

 rovers who hailed from ou'r port had come back to 

 die he was fast nearing the last moorings. His 

 noted grey brig, which it was said had only been 

 seen in the most fearful weather, dashing round 

 about the Goodwins, the Flying Dutchman of those 

 boiling seas, would never be sighted again. " He 

 was born when the tide was full, he will go at its 

 ebb, ?; they said. 



