156 The Naturalist of Cumbrac. 



pacing up and down, with ever-increasing disgust 

 and impatience, and wrath surging up more and more 

 violently in the captain's breast, their stay on shore 

 causing the most inconvenient detention of their own 

 vessel in the offing, and great concern to those on 

 board of it. 



The excursionists saw that they had given, if not 

 good reason, at any rate strong occasion, for the 

 threats and abuse that the irate seaman had showered 

 upon them. They expressed their extreme sorrow 

 for the great trouble and annoyance they had un- 

 consciously caused, and explained the object they 

 had in going out with the boat after dark. This 

 seemed to interest and appease the captain a little, 

 and he appeared at last to be not altogether unwilling 

 to part with them on good terms. The boys r 

 however, on reaching home, expressed a conviction 

 to their mother that, had he been able to reach them 

 when they first came within sight and hearing, he 

 would certainly have tried to put into execution his 

 threat of drowning the whole party. His expressed 

 desire to consign them to a still lower deep than that 

 of ocean may be charitably presumed to have been 

 only sound and fury signifying nothing. 



Though Mrs. Robertson, by not being present,, 

 escaped the discomfort and alarm of the last incident,, 

 of another uncomfortable one she was herself the 

 heroine. With some friends, she and her husband 

 had been searching for curiosities among rock-pools 

 on the coast. Some specimens of a rare starfish 

 were found, of which she undertook the care. Her 

 attention, however, being in some way distracted as 



