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212 , Hick: A Ramble in the Isle of Lindisfarne. 
the lapping of the waves on the rocks below. I had gone out 
early in the morning to wander about the abbey, and musing 
had fallen asleep. It was a lovely scene; far away in the 
through the slight haze, with their lighthouses, which now and 
then flashed as they caught the sun. Below was a reef of 
rocks, the Black Lawe, which are never quite covered by the 
sea, and being isolated are therefore the delight of the sports- 
man. Near to is the playground of the happy baby Seals in 
the breeding season. Farther away are the granite beacons 
on the mainland. There is a hill behind the priory from which 
from time immemorial the old sailors have watched with 
telescopes, now antiquated in pattern, the ships that pass in the 
day. The first one to sight a ship by time-honoured custom 
becomes its pilot. There was something pathetic to me in this 
group of grey-haired men looking for the sails, which are so 
few and far between, when I knew that for years past they had 
done so, and for years to come would do the same. They are 
strangely conservative, these island folk. For instance, a pro- 
posal to alter the road to the church was opposed by them, on 
the ground that they would not be carried to their last resting- 
place along any path except that, along which their fathers for 
generations had been carried. There is a certain grand 
. simplicity about them. One Peter, a well-known character, 
with his guileless nature, his rugged face, his evident poverty, 
and his love for little children, would do well as a model, 
I thought, for his apostolic namesake in the twilight of his life, © 
when his impetuous spirit had been disciplined by the fiery trials 
through which he had passed. Peter is related to about three- 
quarters of the island population, 85 or so of whom bear his 
name. One day he described to me a most beautiful sponge he — 
had got deep-sea fishing, about 2 feet high, with spires like 
a cathedral, which he had bartered to a bootmaker for a pair of 
sea-boots. For 20 years that sponge has stood under a glass 
case in the house of the bootmaker, and Peter during that 
period has been measured several times, at intervals, for those 
boots. He is waiting for them still, with the same patience as 
his fellows with their glasses on the hill-top. They are shrewd, 
too, in their way. They spend their Sabbath mornings ‘gazing, 
as on week days, despite the bell calling them to worship God — 
in the little ancient church near the priory. A Presbyterian 
divine, who was of opinion that the vicar was not doing his 
duty towards these fisher folk, determined to go to them if: they : 
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