The haunted island

THE HAUNTED ISLAND
A PIRATE ROMANCE
By E. H. VISIAK
LONDON ELKIN MATHEWS, VIGO STREET MCMX
THE HAUNTED ISLAND
A PIRATE ROMANCE
Being the History of an Adventure to an Island in the Remote South Sea. Of a Wizard there. Of his Pirate Gang; His Treasure; His Combustible; His Skeleton Antic Lad. Of his Wisdom; Of his Poesy; His Barbarous Cruelty; His Mighty Power. Of a Volcan on the Island. And of the Ghostly Terror.
TO MY MOTHER
THE HAUNTED ISLAND
On Christmas Eve, 1668, I, Francis Clayton, was with my brother Dick at Clayton Manor, our father’s house. ’Tis seated on the bottom of a Bay near Wembury, on the sea coast of Devon. My brother served in quality of lieutenant on board His Majesty’s ship Tiger , and was but late returned from a cruise off the Island of Jamaica. His ship lay at anchor in the bay.
We sat over against one another on the hearth, in my little snug room. The Squire and the servants were a-bed. The great old house slept, with starting and creaking of the timbers. The fire was sunk together, burning with a clear glow; the candles were wasted to the snuff in their sockets.
My brother told a marvellous tale of the South Sea, of an island there haunted by spirits, particularly by a monstrous great ghoul, or devil.