The Lighthouse | Page 4

vest pocket of the dead man. It contained writing, and had been
so securely wrapped up, that it was only a little damped. Davy Spink,
who found it, tried in vain to read the writing; Davy's education had
been neglected, so he was fain to confess that he could not make it out.
"Let me see't," said Swankie. "What hae we here? `The sloop is hard
an--an--'"
"`Fast,' maybe," suggested Spink.
"Ay, so 'tis. I canna make out the next word, but here's something about
the jewel-case."

The man paused and gazed earnestly at the paper for a few minutes,
with a look of perplexity on his rugged visage.
"Weel, man, what is't?" enquired Davy.
"Hoot! I canna mak' it oot," said the other, testily, as if annoyed at
being unable to read it. He refolded the paper and thrust it into his
bosom, saying, "Come, we're wastin' time. Let's get on wi' our wark."
"Toss for the jewels and the siller," said Spink, suggestively.
"Very weel," replied the other, producing a copper. "Heeds, you win
the siller; tails, I win the box;--heeds it is, so the kickshaws is mine.
Weel, I'm content," he added, as he handed the bag of gold to his
comrade, and received the jewel-case in exchange.
In another hour the sea began to encroach on the rock, and the
fishermen, having collected as much as time would permit of the
wrecked materials, returned to their boat.
They had secured altogether above two hundredweight of old metal,--
namely, a large piece of a ship's caboose, a hinge, a lock of a door, a
ship's marking-iron, a soldier's bayonet, a cannon ball, a shoebuckle,
and a small anchor, besides part of the cordage of the wreck, and the
money and jewels before mentioned. Placing the heavier of these things
in the bottom of the boat, they pushed off.
"We better take the corp ashore," said Spink, suddenly.
"What for? They may ask what was in the pockets," objected Swankie.
"Let them ask," rejoined the other, with a grin.
Swankie made no reply, but gave a stroke with his oar which sent the
boat close up to the rocks. They both relanded in silence, and, lifting
the dead body of the old man, laid it in the stern-sheets of the boat.
Once more they pushed off.
Too much delay had been already made. The surf was breaking over

the ledges in all directions, and it was with the utmost difficulty that
they succeeded in getting clear out into deep water. A breeze which had
sprung up from the east, tended to raise the sea a little, but when they
finally got away from the dangerous reef, the breeze befriended them.
Hoisting the foresail, they quickly left the Bell Rock far behind them,
and, in the course of a couple of hours, sailed into the harbour of
Arbroath.
CHAPTER TWO.
THE LOVERS AND THE PRESS-GANG.
About a mile to the eastward of the ancient town of Arbroath the shore
abruptly changes its character, from a flat beach to a range of, perhaps,
the wildest and most picturesque cliffs on the east coast of Scotland.
Inland the country is rather flat, but elevated several hundred feet above
the level of the sea, towards which it slopes gently until it reaches the
shore, where it terminates in abrupt, perpendicular precipices, varying
from a hundred to two hundred feet in height. In many places the cliffs
overhang the water, and all along the coast they have been perforated
and torn up by the waves, so as to present singularly bold and
picturesque outlines, with caverns, inlets, and sequestered "coves" of
every form and size.
To the top of these cliffs, in the afternoon of the day on which our tale
opens, a young girl wended her way,--slowly, as if she had no other
object in view than a stroll, and sadly, as if her mind were more
engaged with the thoughts within than with the magnificent prospect of
land and sea without. The girl was:
"Fair, fair, with golden hair,"
and apparently about twenty years of age. She sought out a quiet nook
among the rocks at the top of the cliffs; near to a circular chasm, with
the name of which (at that time) we are not acquainted, but which was
destined ere long to acquire a new name and celebrity from an incident
which shall be related in another part of this story.

Curiously enough, just about the same hour, a young man was seen to
wend his way to the same cliffs, and, from no reason whatever with
which we happened to be acquainted, sought out the same nook! We
say "he was seen," advisedly, for the maid with the golden hair saw him.
Any ordinary observer would have said that she