324 RAMBLES OF A GEOLOGIST. 



shipmaster visited the miller's, and, curious to ascertain how 

 the cottage would fare when the cock was away, he purchased 

 the bird ; and, sailing from the bay before nightfall, did not 

 return until about a month after. 



On his voyage inwards, he had no sooner doubled an in- 

 tervening headland, than he stepped forward to the bows to 

 take a peep at the cottage : it had vanished. As he ap- 

 proached the anchoring ground, he could discern a heap of 

 blackened stones occupying the place where it had stood ; and 

 he was informed on going ashore, that it had been burnt to 

 the ground, no one knew how, on the very night he had quit- 

 ted the bay. He had it re-built and furnished, says the story, 

 deeming himself what one of the old schoolmen would per- 

 haps term the occasional cause of the disaster. He also re- 

 turned the cock, probably a not less important benefit, 

 and no after accident befel the cottage. About fifteen years 

 ago there was a human skeleton dug up near the scene of 

 the tradition, with the skull, and the bones of the legs and 

 feet, lying close together, as if the body had been huddled up 

 twofold in a hole ; and this discovery led to that of the story, 

 which, though at one time often repeated and extensively be- 

 lieved, had been suffered to sleep in the memories of a few 

 elderly people for nearly sixty years. 



