T&E SEA BEACH Al ORMOND. 43 



The ocean, kingly at times in its majestic power, is 

 to-day wonderfully calm and meek. The surf runs 

 low, the waves breaking on the outer bar, some fifty 

 yards from the water's edge, then flowing peacefully 

 inward. Inch by inch, each one comes nearer and 

 nearer, until in time they will reach and pass be- 

 yond the spot where I now sit. At present one hun- 

 dred yards of sand, at first whitish ; nearer the water, 

 brownish-red, intervenes between me and their edge. 



The rich man, his wife and children, stop at the 

 great hotel; pay $5 each per day for board, and when 

 they wish an outing order a carriage, wrap them- 

 selves in woolens and furs, and ride haughtily along 

 the beach, seeing little beauty in the ocean, less in the 

 land. The poor man, clad in homely frock, walks, in- 

 dependent and free, needing no wraps, his exercise 

 furnishing bodily heat in excess. He breathes great 

 volumes of the invigorating sea air and rejoices that 

 he can pass a few days along these shores. Which of 

 the two is the happier? 



March 10, 1899. The morning cloudy, and by ten 

 o'clock very sultry. I start west from Ormond, going 

 back among the hammocks. In the outskirts of the 

 village, near an old deserted blacksmith shop, I find 

 beneath boards a number of specimens of a large, flat, 

 bluish-green centipede, Scolopendra morsitans L., 

 which is very Common in this vicinity. Its bite is re- 

 puted to be poisonous, but I can find no one who 

 knows by experience whether this is true or not. In 



