The Lair of Something Striped. 75 



eels. The eel keeps near the bottom, as 

 though fearing. He dreads not the blue- 

 fish nor bonita nor swift squeteague, for 

 the runway between the boulder and the 

 cliff is not deep enough for them. See 

 them farther out, though, rising in the 

 curl of a mounting billow till the sun has 

 shot through beneath them, leaping with 

 an energy that goes with fish that fight 

 strong tides for life, not resting, never 

 lagging. How dangerous such needing 

 maws as theirs ! An ink-laden squid 

 pumps faster with his siphon engine as he 

 steers in graceful curve through the run- 

 way. He too suspects that it is a lurking 

 place. What shadow slowly moved across 

 the bottom then ? Was it from some 

 pausing cormorant or circling tern ? From 

 this jutting storm-bleached jag of cliff I 

 dare to look up, but no bird flies over- 

 head. 'T was but the shifting of the kelp 

 perhaps, for down in the runway waters I 

 see almost as clearly as through the north 

 wind. 'T was but the waving of sea 

 fronds. 



Why though has all sign of life stopped 



