THE ARCHIPELAGO OF CHAUSET. 23 



It will readily be supposed that superstitious fears 

 have become intimately associated with these lugu- 

 brious memorials of former times. When the ruins 

 are shrouded in night, and when a sudden squall 

 from the west throws over them the light spray of 

 the waves, there is not an inhabitant of Chausey who 

 would venture to approach them, or who would dare 

 to expose himself to the risk of seeing the red flames 

 which flicker round the court of the old castle, or of 

 hearing the groans which, issuing from the sides of 

 the rock, are lost amid the crash of the storm. 



Chausey has, however, more modern and more 

 cheerful traditions. I heard much of M. Beautemps- 

 Beaupre and of his labours ; and I was also informed 

 that several years before two gentlemen had come to 

 instal themselves on the island, accompanied by their 

 young wives. For four months they had explored 

 the shore, ransacked the sands, and examined the 

 ledges of rocks. Besides this they had established, 

 in the neighbourhood of the farm, tanks filled with 

 sea-water, communicating with tubes, and in these 

 portable pools and artificial rivers they had kept all 

 kinds of marine animals. These practices had given 

 rise to a very large consumption of lobsters and 

 crabs, not that the gentlemen devoured them, but 

 they cut them up, dismembered them, syringed them, 

 and examined them with strange-looking instruments. 

 When the husbands went out fishing their wives 

 accompanied them, and in all respects led an equally 

 exposed life. When they were not engaged in these 

 excursions the latter devoted their time to household 

 duties and to drawing. At this time an epidemic 



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