Jethou | Page 4

at which city,
being my first visit to the metropolis, I could fain have broken our
journey, but our business being urgent we steamed away to Plymouth

by the night train. After a substantial meal next morning we sallied out
to find the first vessel sailing to Guernsey, and were lucky in
discovering one called the "Fawn," which was preparing to sail the
same day. Although only a cargo ketch the skipper bargained to take us,
and about two p.m. we unmoored and were soon off. Our passage was a
quick one, a strong N.W. wind bowling us over to St. Peter Port in time
for early breakfast next morning.
It is needless for me to go through the whole story of the running
ashore of our smack, as beyond the important fact that it was her
mishap which caused me ever to visit the Channel Islands, she has little
else to do with my narrative.
She was damaged very seriously amidships, but my father, who had a
happy knack of turning almost everything to a good account, unless
irredeemably hopeless, was struck with a capital idea in this instance.
Instead of selling her as a worthless hulk, he had her cut in two, the
damaged timbers removed, a new length of keel laid down, and had her
lengthened about ten feet; after which operation she was as sound as
ever, and as my father had prophesied, no one recognized her again for
the same vessel.
While we were waiting for the "Kittywitch" (for that was her name) to
be run off the slips, we had plenty of time to look about us; in fact, we
spent nearly seven weeks among these lovely islands.
We explored Guernsey and Sark thoroughly, also Herm as far as we
were allowed, that island being more of a proprietary place than the
others. We also spent about ten days in Jersey, which is quite a large
place in comparison with the other islands. But of all the islands, I
think Sark carries off the palm, not that it has beauties of its own, or is
grander or more prolific, but it is an epitome of all the other islands; in
fact it contains in a small space every salient feature of the Channel
Isles; the people, the granite cliffs, the bays, the caves, the hills, the
woods, the shady lanes, the sandy beaches, are all there, and the
surrounding sea is not a tone the less blue in its intensity, nor the air a
whit less balmy than that with which the other islands are favoured.

Now it happened, while we were staying at St. Peter Port, awaiting the
re-launching of our vessel, that we made friends with the proprietor of
the island of Jethou, upon which the "Kittywich" struck, and although it
was a good three miles from St. Peter's harbour, yet we made
occasional trips to the islet when the wind was fair and the sea smooth.
With this little island of Jethou I was charmed, and fancied I could
make it my Paradise, if only I could be allowed to live there for a
twelvemonth, _a la_ Robinson Crusoe.
At this idea my father, who was a thoroughly business-like,
matter-of-fact man, set up his eyes and called me a name not at all
polite; but as he was my parent, and viewed life through older optics
than mine, I daresay he was right in the main, when he called me, to put
it mildly, a "stupid fool." But although he pooh-poohed the idea, and
bade me dismiss it from my mind, I could not help the thought entering
my brain, and I wished something might possibly happen by which I
might be left alone on the island, to try, at all events, what Crusoe life
was really like.
Sure enough something did happen which ultimately gave me the
opportunity of carrying out my idea in its entirety. M. Oudin, the
proprietor of the island, had two events to chronicle in one day, events
which quite altered his after life, and took him at an hour's notice from
his Jethou home to Gardner's Hotel, Guernsey.
A letter arrived at St. Peter Port for him, from Paris, which, according
to custom, was placed in the guernsey breast of a fisherman, who sailed
with it straightway to M. Oudin. The latter gentleman having adjusted
his glasses, after instructing his man to give the messenger spirituous
refreshment (which is so very cheap in these islands), proceeded to
scan the contents of the letter. It was from a lawyer in Paris, informing
him of the decease of his brother, a leather merchant, who, dying
wifeless and childless, had bequeathed him both his business and
fortune. This intelligence of both joy and sorrow so bewildered and
unstrung the nerves