“A BARRIER OF SAND STRETCHING FOR TWENTY MILES ALONG THE SOUTH COAST OF LONG ISLAND”

LEGENDS OF FIRE
ISLAND BEACH and
the SOUTH SIDE

BY
EDWARD RICHARD SHAW

NEW YORK
LOVELL, CORYELL & COMPANY
310-318 Sixth Avenue

Copyright, 1895,
by
United States Book Company

TO MY FRIEND
WILLIAM S. PELLETREAU
OF SOUTHAMPTON, L. I.

PREFACE.

These stories embody only a small part of the folk-lore and tradition that pertained to the Great South Bay. They were told by a class of men now gone. Fact, imagination, and superstition—each contributed its part. In the tavern, among groups of men collected on shore from wind-bound vessels, at gatherings around the cabin fire, and in those small craft that were constantly going from one part of the bay to another, not only these tales, but others, irrevocably lost, were elaborated and made current in days homely and toilsome yet invested with an atmosphere of romance.

Many of the illustrations in this volume are reproductions from photographs taken by Mr. R. Eickemeyer, Jr., medallist of the Royal Photographic Society, on his visits to Long Island. The artistic excellence of Mr. Eickemeyer’s pictures is widely known, and the author, in appreciation of his interest and kindness, desires to make here grateful acknowledgment.

Bellport, Long Island,

June 25, 1895.

CONTENTS

PAGE [The Pot of Gold] 11 [The Bogy of the Beach] 41 [The Mower’s Phantom] 59 [Enchanted Treasure] 96 [The Money Ship] 115 [Widow Molly] 142 [The Mineral-Rod] 188 [Notes] 208

“On old Long Island’s sea-girt shore,

Many an hour I’ve whiled away.”

THE POT OF GOLD

Fire Island Beach is a barrier of sand, stretching for twenty miles along the south coast of Long Island, and separating the Great South Bay from the Atlantic ocean.

To reach it, you must make a sail of from three to seven miles, and once upon it, you find it a wild, desolate, solitary spot, wind-searched and surf-pounded.

Its inner shore is covered with a growth of tide-wet sedge, with here and there a spot where dry meadow comes down to make a landing-place.

The outline of this inner shore is most irregular, curving and bending in and out and back upon itself, making coves and points and creeks and channels, and often pushing out in flats with not water enough on them at low tide to wet your ankles.

A third of the distance across the Beach, the meadow ends and sand begins. This slopes gradually up for another third of the distance, to the foot of the sand hills, which seem tumbled into their places by some mighty power, sometimes three tiers of them deep, sometimes two, and sometimes only one.

These sand hills are the most striking features of the Beach. The biggest of them are not more than sixty feet high, yet so hard a feat is it to climb to the top, and so extended is the view below you—on one side the wide Bay, on the other, the ocean stretching its restless surface to the horizon—that you feel yourself upon an elevation tenfold as high.

Through these hills the wind makes a great galloping, whirling out deep bowl-shape hollows among them, and piling the shifting sand upon their summits. Now and then you will notice a hill with its shoulder knocked off by the wind, and a ton of sand gone no one can tell where. In every storm their contour changes, and yet their general formation is so similar at all times that the change is seldom thought of. A coarse spear-like grass finds a sparse growth upon them, and does what it can to hold the sand in place; but it has a hard time of it, as its blades buried to their tips or its naked roots often testify.

But there is one part of this Beach that is ever much the same. It is a broad, shelving strip of sand between the hills and the sea, where the tide rises and falls, pounding and grinding, year in and year out—the play-ground and the battle-ground of the surf.

On a summer’s day, I have seen this surf so low and quiet that one could launch a sharpie upon it, single-handed, and come ashore again without shipping a quart of water. At other times it is a terror to look at—a steady break of waves upon the outer bar, with row after row coming in, rearing and plunging as they strike the shore. In such a sea there is no launching yawl or surf-boat, and no coming ashore.

When the tide is on the right moon and the wind has blown a gale from the southeast, the strand is entirely submerged, and people upon the main shore three miles away can see the surf breaking over the Beach hills.

Such a riot of sea and wind strews the whole extent of beach with whatever has been lost or thrown overboard, or torn out of sunken ships. Many a man has made a good week’s work in a single day by what he has found while walking along the Beach when the surf was down.

“The Captain” knew all this and had patrolled that Beach scores of times.

Ten years had passed since the first time which laid the habit of wandering along the surf-shore apparently in search of whatever the sea had cast up. Sometimes a spar, sometimes sheets of copper torn from a wreck and carried by a high surf far along the strand, sometimes a vessel’s gilded name, at other times only scattered drift-wood were the rewards of these lonely walks.

People about the neighborhood where the Captain lived, knew that at one time or another he brought these relics from the Beach; yet no one supposed that the finding of them was related to his life in any other way than mere happen so. Anyone who went upon the Bay at all was likely to land at the Beach. Once there, it was a natural impulse to go across and walk along the ocean side; for, at that time, early in the thirties, it was widely believed that the sea had wealth, and often threw it up upon the shore. Never, however, was it in the least surmised by the Captain’s neighbors that these solitary excursions had woven themselves in as a part of the texture of his life.

Had, though, these good neighbors been quick to perceive they would have noticed one characteristic of the Captain, sufficiently manifest at times—that he was always in the best of spirits when a storm was raging. At such times he had been heard to remark, “This is a wild day, my friend, but just such days is needed.”

And it was not till years afterward that neighbor Rob’son actually understood the import of a strange remark made to him by the Captain one stormy night, when the wind blew fiercely from the south-east, and drove aslant the thin rain which the low scudding black clouds let down.

Mr. Rob’son had been belated and was hurrying to get home. The Captain, meeting him, called out in the most cheerful of tones, “Hello, is that you, neighbor Rob’son?” and giving him time for merely a bare “Yes,” he continued, “This is a monstrous night. Do you hear the ocean pound over on the Beach? There’ll be tons of sand shifted to-night—tons of it; more’n all the men out on a gen’ral trainin’ day could shovel in a year. You’re in a hurry, I see, neighbor. I ain’t. I’m in no haste to get in-doors. A great night like this fits me. Somehow it puts new spirit into me.”

Was it the storm that made the Captain’s heart so buoyant and his mind so cheerful? or was it because such days and nights made more certain the realization of that secret hope which had possessed him for years?

So secret was this hope that even his wife surmised nothing of it; for, happily, she was not one of those unfortunate women who are endowed with satanic intuition, and whose lives thereby are made miserable until they have followed up and chased into clear daylight all the dusky suspicions that flit, perchance, into their minds.

But although a matter-of-fact wife, she had, it must be confessed, noticed more closely than her neighbors the effect a storm had upon her husband; and she had learned to put off until such a time those various little requests about the house, which appear in a man’s eyes so great a matter to get about, and which he usually puts off and shirks with an unaccountable dread. Every little change, therefore, she needed, of driving a nail here, putting a shelf there, or the mending perhaps of a churn-dasher, he cheerfully made at those times; and she would often remark to him, “It’s astonishin’ how much you’ll get done on a stormy day, and the harder the storm the more you’ll manage to get through with.”

If, however, these odds and ends were not finished during the storm, they were suffered to go over, as the Captain was certain to leave home early the next morning; and to any neighbor who chanced to inquire for him, the reply was made that he had gone upon the Bay.

“Gone upon the Bay.” That expression was in those days a most convenient one for a bay-man. The persistent following of the Bay for a livelihood at the present time causes each man to hold closely to one kind of work. But then, there was no telling when a man set out from home how his day would be spent—he might go oystering or gunning, he might cast his nets or waste his time sailing in search of what he deemed better luck. Varying conditions of wind and weather and tide offered, one day, one thing, and the next day, something else; and what use a bay man would make of his day grew out of these conditions and his own ambition.

The Captain, however, on the morning after a storm, paid no attention to what these conditions offered till he had visited the Beach and sought again the realization of his hope. He never failed to be on there early on such mornings, to see what the wind and the sea had done.

And so it turned out upon this very day. There had been a sudden and violent storm the previous night, and the Captain had crossed the Bay and was making one of his solitary patrols of the Beach.

Across his shoulder was thrown his gun, as this he always carried with him. And although he took no silver with him, as certain gunners were known to do, to substitute for lead should there occur any emergency bearing the suggestion of witchery about it, yet he felt, in some way which he did not care to examine, more comfortable with his gun in his hand. He knew well all those stories of witchcraft and mystery about the Beach which superstition and imagination had set afloat in various localities along the “South Side.” How the witches would come at night and rattle the latch upon old Uncle Payne’s gunning house, and how the owner fastened the latch with a shilling piece, crept in the window, and invariably loaded his gun with a silver sixpence to blaze away at these midnight revellers, should he hear the slightest indications of their freaks. And how gunners, taking the surest aim at the wild duck that flew to their decoys, had oftentimes been baffled in hitting them, finding, in such instances, the shot roll out of the barrel as the gun was lowered. And how many a gunner carried a lucky-bone in his pocket as an amulet against such sinister misfortune.

He had heard, too, of that sheltered spot on the north-west side of [Watch Hill], inclosed by a clump of old bayberry bushes and low cedars, where searchers for money had occasionally gone with a mineral rod; and who, whenever they began to probe for treasure, were always frightened away by a huge black snake that wriggled itself up the stem of a bush, and stretched out at full length along the top of the foliage, darting its tongue and hissing as if guardian of the enchanted spot. And more marvelous still, the tradition of a stone, circular and flat, bearing upon its surface the image of a man’s face, that had at times been run upon, near the Point of Woods, but which never could be found when deliberate search was made for it.

While the Captain thought he put no real credence in these stories, yet he felt more or less apprehensive when upon the Beach. A sense of mystic awe, which he could not explain always possessed him there, and notwithstanding his disbelief in witchcraft, he would sooner have abandoned his quests than forego the companionship of his gun.

All the morning long, that idea which had come to him with strange force ten years ago, and which had engendered the secretly cherished hope, was uppermost in his mind. So strongly did it dominate his thoughts when he was alone by the ocean that it had forced itself into words. Over and over again he stated it as he talked to himself, adding this time one tradition, the next time another. No one was near to hear it. The very utterance cheered him and fed his hope.

Becoming somewhat tired in his patrol, for he had already walked fully seven miles, he ascended one of the sand dunes to reconnoitre the Bay, and assure himself whether any boat was making towards this part of the Beach. He saw only two or three sails abreast of Patchogue, and these were bound westward. Feeling, therefore, that he could take the time, he threw himself down to rest.

The day was clear and bright, with a light breeze astir. The wide Bay was blue in the sunlight. Near the hither shore he saw a long file of wild ducks sweep a graceful curve and flutter down upon their feeding ground. On the farther shore stretched the stately woodland, its whole extent broken only by the meadows about the creeks, and the few patches of green that revealed the scattered farms. This was all the prospect. No church spire stretched itself upward as a landmark, no village showed white along the shore, no fleet boats with pleasure-seekers sped here and there.

His weariness soon passed, and as he descended to resume his walk, the sand, flowing down the steep hillside as fast as he trod, set his thoughts back again upon the old theme. “The sand on this Beach is all the time a changin’. What are hollows now ’ill be hills in a few years. Sea and rain and wind are all the time at work. The wind, though, puts in the most time. How soon it ’ill sweep out a hole and carry the sand up the side of a hill anybody knows who has been on this Beach in a blow. It handles sand in about the same way it drifts snow.

“No, I’ll never dig for treasure, and I’ve no belief in mineral rods. Too many fools have used ’em. Watch Hill has all been dug around ag’in and ag’in, and never anyone found a shillin’ for all their potterin’. If there’s anythin’ valu’ble buried on this Beach, sometime or other it ’ill be laid bare—that Money Ship wa’n’t off and on here so many times fur nothin’—there’s got to be treasure here, and who’s more likely to find it than me? No man watches this Beach closer, and nobody knows I’m watchin’ it, either. It’ll come, too, one of these days! If a man’s determined enough and only holds on long enough, what he’s desirin’ and hopin’ for is sure to come round, else he wouldn’t feel so sure about it all the time all through him. It’ll come, it’s sure to come, and then I’ll build my vessel.”

This had been the Captain’s theory. He had held on. Never in the least had he slackened hope.

During the storm the tide had run high, surging up and washing away the foot of the sand hills. As far as his eye could reach, he saw the precipitous side of hill after hill. This very condition led him on a mile or more farther than he generally walked. And then, as no footprints but his own were to be seen anywhere on the crisp sand, he determined to go on still farther. He had walked perhaps half a mile, having lapsed into that state of reverie apt to come upon one who has urged himself beyond the accustomed limit of toil, when suddenly, through the drowsiness of his mind, a perception, unheeded at the time by the other senses, flitted back, awakening and concentrating all the faculties upon itself. In a moment he turned about, saying, “I believe I’ll go back and see what that actually was that looked like a piece o’ black glass midway up the bank.” Reaching the spot, he stepped up the slope and began to dig away the sand. He saw at once that it was a small glass or earthenware pot of a blackish color, which settled quickly as he dug.

“Ah,” exclaimed he, “the day’s here! The day’s got here at last!”

Clasping it in his hands, he weighed it, so to speak, lifting it up and down till his surprised senses needed nothing more to convince them. He examined it, but found no mark upon it, not even upon the resin with which it was sealed. Suddenly a strange alarm rose up within him, and he feared someone would come upon him. He obeyed his first thought and looked quickly eastward and then westward along the surf shore, but saw no living form. Someone, though, might be crossing the Beach and might at any moment appear on the crest of the hill just above him. Before the thought which suggested this had really passed, he began digging a place in the sand, and in it he set the heavy pot. The hole, however, was not deep enough, and he lifted the pot out. But thinking it would take too long to dig the hole deeper, he put the pot back again, took off his coat, threw it over the spot, and laid his gun atop of these. With steps as agile as any youth of twenty, he climbed up the slipping sand to the crest of the hill and looked keenly over the Bay. He found himself as secure from interruption as when an hour or more ago he lay down to rest and enjoy the scene. In a second he had returned to the hole and was lifting out the pot, determined to open it at once.

Doubts, however, thrust themselves upon him. “Why had he taken so much for granted? What was really the need of all his alarm? After all the jar might only be filled with bullets or shot.”

But another thought crowded closely along with these doubtful ones. “No, it couldn’t be. He hadn’t at last espied this jar—the only thing that met his hope for the countless times that he had walked along this shore—to find in it only lead. It had treasure in it of some kind. He was sure of it. His feelings told him so.”

Opening his jack-knife he began to cut away the resin from the mouth of the jar, making slow progress with the hard covering. At length he reached the stopper, and tried to pry out the thick cork, but with such haste that his knife-blade broke, and he was forced to cut down on one side of the stopper. Deeming he had been a long time opening the jar, his old alarm returned, again suggesting that someone might be approaching. A second time he scanned the shore in both directions, covered the jar with his coat, ran up the steep and looked over the Beach and over the Bay. No sign of approach or molestation was anywhere discernible. Condemning the alarm that had so wrought upon him in stronger terms than is necessary to use here, he returned to the spot, and this time, instead of kneeling, sat down and took the jar in his lap. Not a great while elapsed before he had cut away enough of the cork to thrust in the blunt edge of his knife. A pry, a deeper thrust, another pry, and out came the thick stopper. But now he was startled, fearing that he had opened some magical jar, and was, at last, to be entangled in that witchery he so strongly discredited; for, strange to relate, upon looking in, he saw something that resembled either lint or cotton, and which no sooner had the air touched, than it slowly lost its substance and vanished. His affright went, however, as quickly as the mysterious exhalation, for there lay the coins of gold, as bright as on the day when Tom Knight, the buccaneer, afraid the town magistrate would search the Beach and find them evidence against him, had sealed the coins up in the jar, and hid it among the hills.

He tipped the jar aside to disturb the coins, observing as they slid over, other traces of the lint or cotton, which had evidently been used to pack the coins in layers, either as security to the jar, or to muffle any clink that would excite suspicion in removal. But his purpose in tipping the jar was not to witness the exhalation of the fluffy substance—he had another object in view. So, canting the jar first towards him and then from him to secure as varied a change of the contents as possible, he peered to the very bottom. Nothing there but gold, the yellowest of gold.

Reaching in with two fingers, he brought out a coin between them, and began to examine it. The date, 1783, was all that was familiar to him. Looking at the other side, he recognized the image of a crown, and under it, upon a shield, figures of lions, standing on their hind legs, with long tails curved like the letter S. Was it English money? The letters, HISPAN-ET-IND, around the edge, were unintelligible to him. He turned the coin back to the date side. Here was the profile of some rotund personage, and over his head, CAROLUS III. DEI-GRATIA. It was the third of some monarch, that was evident enough; but the DEI-GRATIA was just as puzzling as the letters on the other side. Reaching in for another coin, he read the date, 1799. Above was a slightly different profile, the same name, but after it was IIII. instead of III. He drew coin after coin from the jar until he had several in his hand. Except the dates they were in the main alike. He conjectured that they were doubloons—Spanish doubloons; and his conjecture was right. Satisfied with the examination he had made, he piled the doubloons in a column in one hand, and with the other, lifted the pile and let them drop, one by one, to hear the solid chink. This, however, did not reach up to the height of his feelings. So he spread out his coat, and made, with a few blows of his hand upon the yielding sand underneath, a concave surface. Then lifting the pot, he poured out the coins in a glittering stream. Their fall was musical, and when the last one fell, he scooped up double handfuls, held them high, and let the dazzling stream run again.

It was the first golden dream realized since the days when Captain Kidd was said to have buried his ill-gotten treasure in countless spots upon that Beach. How would that gold have dazzled the sight of all those argonauts who had made so many continuous but fruitless searches for the money reputed to be hid among those sand hills! What exultation would the sound of those falling yellow disks from the old mint of Mexico have wrought in those who had dredged persistently but in vain upon the bar where the long-boats of the Money-ship upset, or those who by moonlight and by starlight had walked to and fro over the hills, grasping the mineral rod, and digging where its delusive twitch indicated, until weary with toil and disappointment.

While the Captain’s whole attention was completely absorbed in this revel with his gold, a coasting vessel had been approaching. It is true that the schooner was a mile or perhaps farther from the shore, “but with their spy-glass,” thought the Captain, as he discovered the vessel, “those on board can plainly see just what I’ve got here.” Hurriedly dipping up handful after handful, he slid the coins carefully into the jar, and after the stopper was replaced, wrapped his coat about it, reached his gun, and disappeared over the hills.

When he came to his boat, he tied the coat securely about the jar with odd strands of rope, and placed the prize carefully under forward. When night fell, it was his intention to make towards home.

The south-west breeze had gathered with the day, and blew freshly even from the Beach shore. Out in the Bay, where it had wide, unhindered scope, it had added to itself, pushing the waves before it, and urging them with such impetuosity that their crests grew flurried and broke into white, foamy caps. Every leaf on the “South Shore” was astir, fluttering and tugging in the moist wind; and the trees bended and straightened to trim all their spread of canvas to the sweeps of the breeze.

“Ruther rougher than I care for tonight,” thought the Captain, “but the wind’ll fall after the sun sinks; I’ll give it time.”

The color had gone from the few strips of cloud that lay about the sundown spot, and the gray twilight arch stretched across the west, as the Captain cleared away for home. Along the eastern sky, well up, a glow of dull orange spread itself, and creeping up to the glow and gradually transmuting it, was a cold blue, the blue of advancing night—a color so rare that it is matched nowhere else than on polished steel when the blacksmith tempers it.

The Captain steered with a strong and steady hand, and watched his sail with a vigilant eye. But give heed as closely as he might to his craft, there played with his fancy the glowing rays of distant Fire Island Light. It had just been built. Again and again its gleams, falling on the dark side of some tumbling wave, caused the Captain to turn his head and look over his shoulder to the source whence they came. The light was, in truth, no guide to him on this night, but thoughts of the time when it would be, kept recurring. He called to mind going in and out of Fire Island Inlet years ago, before a light-house was ever proposed, and of how difficult a place the Inlet was to enter after nightfall. But now, no matter how thick the night, bring that light to bear north-east, and one was inside and out of harm’s way. What an advantage it was! He thought, too, of how he should see it far ahead, when making a run homeward from Coney Island; of the times he should have to lie anchored within the inlet waiting for fit weather to go out, and how companionable that light would be sending out its bright rays on wild, stormy nights.

All that the Captain fancied came true in the years that immediately followed. Speedily the timbers of a vessel were got out and set up, and duly “The Turk” was launched. What odd notion dictated the name was never known. It was thought, though, by many of his neighbors that some name suggestive of that which made the long-wished-for vessel a reality, should have been given her. Indeed, there was no little comment about it at the time, and much protest whenever the vessel was discussed. It was overlooked, however, in this instance as it had been in several others, that the Captain held views and ideas quite opposite to those of most people who knew him; for what one of these neighbors, had he conceived the idea of finding buried treasure, would have done as the Captain did, and waited for the wind and the sea to dig it for him?

THE BOGY OF THE BEACH

Strange things happen on that Beach and have happened. My experience was no new one, but it takes hold of a man, nevertheless, and he can’t shake it off for months. Ever since white men frequented that Beach, some one at intervals has undergone the same foreboding experience.

In the early part of the last century a whaling crew, half Indians, had their hut east of [Quanch]. They used to land and come off at the point there, where the water is deep, called Whale House Point till this day. From the days of the earliest settlement, whaling crews used to go on the Beach. They would live there during the season and watch the sea day by day, ready to launch their boats and push off whenever they saw a whale blow. Their supplies were brought from the north side of the Island, and fires were built on Long Point as a signal for the crew to come off. The Long Point of those days is now Ireland’s Point, which pushes out into the bay a mile, about, west of the mouth of Carman’s river.

When a fire flashed up at night, part of the crew would row across the bay, heading directly for the fire. After they had put the supplies in their boat and were ready to return, they would throw sand on the fire and put it out. Soon after it disappeared a fire would blaze up on the Beach to guide them back. In that way Fire Place got its old name. That was a name that had something behind it and never ought to have been changed.

This crew had been expecting for three days the signal fire. They were getting short of supplies. People didn’t get around lively in those times, you know. The trouble was that they hadn’t much to get around lively with.

For two nights until nearly midnight—all this I heard from my great-grandfather—the crew had set a watch on the top of Quanch Hill to look out for the signal fire upon Long Point. Now the curious thing about this is that a man named Jonas was the watch both nights. The first night was his regular watch, but the second night he volunteered to take the place of another member of the crew. The men in the hut spoke about this during the evening. None of them, however, knew that Jonas’s idea was to satisfy himself as to whether the strange experience he had had the night before would repeat itself. That Beach, you know, is one of the most lonely places in the world. There are times when it’s awful on there. Take it on a dark night with the wind wild and the sea mad.

That night Jonas made up his mind to walk eastward a mile and a half. Frequently he would go down in the hollows and stop to listen. He heard the sound of the wind in the grass, and the beat of the surf—each of these distinctly. And yet something more. His heart began to thump and his own breathing interfered with his judgment. He tried hard to listen. Could he be deceived? he asked himself. Suddenly he turned and walked to the top of a hill where no grass grew. He got his breath and then held it. He heard even the delicate beat of the particles of sand blown by the wind, and he was sure that besides he recognized what he had heard in the hollow. He could not be mistaken. Farther away now, moving among the hills—almost gone, then quite gone. The thought occurred to him then that he had forgotten he was on the lookout. Immediately he scanned the horizon to the northeast of him but discerned no spot of flickering red. He looked up at the stars to see how far they had moved westward. Some drifting clouds obscured two or three stars he knew best, so he waited till the clouds had shifted, and then he knew it was near midnight. There was no use to watch longer, for those who brought supplies never made a fire after midnight. He turned to make his way toward the hut. He had not taken three steps, when he stopped and stood stock-still again. He heard distinctly the rumble and beat of the surf, the sifting of the sand, the sound of the wind in the dried beach grass, yet plainly apart from these something else. It moved on the wind rapidly away and away, and was gone. But as he stood thinking of it, it came again, stronger than before. This time not eastward of him, but clearly westward. His head grew hot. It moved farther and farther to the west, rising and falling, then with sudden increasing force stopped abruptly. He made his way to the hut and crept into his bunk. It was two hours before he got to sleep.

The next morning a whale was sighted close in shore. The crew launched their whale-boat and put off for him. They calculated where he would next rise and rowed to the spot. He came up lengthwise of the boat, just far enough ahead to smash it with his flukes. It was a right whale, and they strike sideways, you know, with their tail.

“Stern all,” was the order quickly uttered. A short distance back, they whirled the boat around, and then pulled at the order. [Whale-boats], I suppose you know, are sharp at both ends.

Before they were in position, however, to row straight on to the whale and keep clear of his flukes, he started. Quebax, the harpooneer, fastened his oar, grasped the harpoon, rose up in the bow and threw it. It was a long throw, fifteen feet, but it was the only chance. The harpoon entered the side of the whale and must have held securely. But the whale turned suddenly and struck the boat with his head. The crew sprang overboard just in time, for the next moment the whale stove the boat into flinders. The wind, so it happened, favored them, as it was blowing directly on shore. All the crew reached the Beach except Quebax. He was missing, nor was his body ever found. The bow of the boat, to which the line was fastened never came ashore, so it was thought that Quebax got entangled in the line. It was toward the end of the season—this whale would have made their sixth—and the disaster broke up their whaling for that year.

No man of that crew felt the great sense of relief at leaving the Beach that Jonas did, and never after would he go on there to remain overnight. He said nothing at the time about his weird experience among those Beach hills the night before Quebax was lost, but in later years he told it all.

And then, again, I have heard it said that for several nights before that awful catastrophe at Old Inlet, at the time of the War of 1812, the same strange calling and shouting was heard among the hills.

Old Uncle Payne, whose gunning house stood east of Molasses Island Point near Quanch, declared that twice in his life he heard at midnight the moaning in the hills, and each time thereafter had found bodies washed ashore.

But at [Fiddleton], at Watch Hill, and through all the hollows there, down around Pickety Rough, even on Flat Beach, the eerie holloing, the shouting and calling, unlike any human voice, that was heard on different nights, suddenly changing, too, from one spot of the beach to another, foreboded the drowning of those fifteen buccaneers from the Money Ship and the burying in the sea for all time of their blood spent treasure. Yet having heard all this, though years before, I joined the first life-saving crew of Station No. —. The season then was a short one. Regular patrols of the Beach with exchange of checks for tally was then a thing undreamt of. Only in thick, foggy, or stormy weather did we walk the Beach. I can’t see any use of patrolling that Beach in good weather and wearing the crew out. To my thinking all that is necessary on bright days or on clear starlight and moonlight nights is to keep a man on the lookout with a good glass beside him, and so save the crew; for there come times when the rescuing of life depends upon the reserve strength of the men. Yes, there come emergencies on that coast when power of endurance is the important, the decisive thing. The way to meet such unexpected demands and emergencies is to give the crew a chance to store up reserve force, power to hold on, to make a great effort for a night and a day, perhaps. This is what counts when a vessel is ashore far more than any regular patrolling, with the men on the go bright weather as well as bad weather.

We had pretty good weather that year till after the holidays had passed. Then there came a spell of thick weather. I remember distinctly how it set in. The day had been a very bright one, with a tinge of warmth in it. But at nightfall an ominous murky drift of cloud gathered in the southwest, a lee set for a northeaster.

The order was given for patrol that night, and the eastern beat fell to me. When the tide began to rise the wind hauled northeast by east and blew lightly down the coast. It didn’t seem to portend snow, but the weather began to thicken. I faced the wind and walked briskly, but it bit my face and searched under my clothing as only a northeast wind will do. When within a quarter of a mile of the end of my beat, I struck a match and held it between my two hands as a sort of a shield, and let it burn. If you have never tried this, you have no idea how far such a light may be seen in the darkness or how large a spot of light it appears to make. Lanterns are of no account on that Beach. No lantern will burn when a high wind is blowing sand before it. They choke up and go out. And as about the only time when they would be of use is when they won’t burn, they’re not carried. Then, after all, it’s no place for them. They’ll do round the barnyard, but the coast is no place for a light, down almost on the surf’s edge, bobbing and moving along in the darkness.

I lit another match and still another, but got no answer, so I concluded that the patrol up from the next station was returning. I reached the end of my beat, and waited some time under the lee of a hill, and near midnight began my patrol back. Passing a deep opening between the hills, my attention was attracted by a low moaning. At first I gave little heed to it. Then later I walked up to the top of one of the hills that flank the strand all along and listened. I faced the wind; then I stood back to it. I turned my ear in every direction, even bent my head down to render my hearing more acute. I could not distinguish any strange sound. No sooner, however, had I descended to the strand and resumed my walk than the moaning began again, seeming as before to be just over behind the hills. It was continuous but uneven, like the wind. It moved down the Beach as I walked, just abreast of me apparently, but over behind the hills, considerably farther, however, toward the bayside when I passed any low spot of beach. When within half a mile of the station, it was gone. I noticed instantly when it ceased.

An experience of this kind disturbs a man’s soul, and the more he fights it the greater trouble it becomes and the more uneasiness it gives him. But I said nothing about it at the station.

The thick weather continued. A seething, boiling surf was running, showing that there had been a big storm off shore. Such a surf always indicates that. We couldn’t see much beyond the outer bar for several days.

In the next patrol at night I felt sure I should hear the moaning again, and I did. It followed abreast of me on my patrol out, and was gone as I approached the meeting-place at the end of my beat. But on my return it came again and followed in the same way as before. I didn’t stop once to bother with it, but kept walking steadily back. It left me when about the same distance from the house as on the first night.

The next night my patrol began at midnight on the short beat to the west. I heard nothing out of the usual course of nature till I got within three-quarters of a mile of the half-way hut. Then I heard not only the moaning, but other noises not human, and a clapping or beating as with two flat sticks. All this was confined to one spot, and I could locate that spot exactly: in a rather deep hollow, with three hills butting up around. The wind from some cause always drew down into that hollow and kept its whole surface smooth, not a spear or root of grass there, and as round as the inside of a cup.

As I heard the voice, its hideous changes, which at times seemed to run into a part of some strange and weird tune, and the clapping along with it, I knew that all this foreboded some dreadful thing.

Hot flushes came over me and I sweat at every pore. But I kept on walking just as steadily as I could. I didn’t want to quicken my pace a bit, and I had to hold myself down in order not to do it. I left the noises and clapping farther and farther behind, till at last I could not hear them. They didn’t move, however, but remained right in that hollow. At length I came to the place where the half-way hut was, and turned up from the strand to go to it.

This hut stood well up in a sort of narrow pass that opened in a northwesterly direction through the surf hills. You could see the hut, coming from the east, but not from the west. It was built of old timbers and covered with seaweed and sand.

I entered, glad to get in there, and began to blow up a fire from the embers left by the patrolman from the west. I loaded my pipe and lit it, and the fire gave me some cheer. I stayed there an hour, I should think, dreading awfully to go. But the thing had to be done, so I buttoned up my coat and started. As I came down to the strand suddenly I caught sight of something coming toward me dripping wet. The strength went out of my legs as quick as lightning, and my knees gave way. I nerved myself up at once, and there was need of it, too, for a voice—a human voice—called to me for help. It was a sailor who had just crawled up out of the surf. Instinctively I looked off shore and saw a vessel on the outer bar. She was not there an hour back, when I passed by.

The sailor sank down exhausted after he called to me. I helped him into the hut and blew up the fire.

“Are there any others?” I asked.

“No,” he replied, “I am the only one.”

I laid on more fuel, left him, and walked along shore, looking into the surf with the keenest eye I had. I set off lights, but no answer. Then I went back to the hut, and the sailor had recovered sufficiently to give me a full account of how the vessel came on.

“We had thick weather for several days,” he said, “and had lost our reckoning. We struck heavily on the bar off here, sounded, and made up our minds that we were on Nantucket Shoals, and that the only thing for us to do was to land. We hauled the boat up on the leeward side, the men got in, and I stood on the rail to cast off. Just as I had thrown down the painter, a big sea, coming round the stern of the vessel, struck the boat and turned her bottom side up. It happened in less than no time, for I had let go and had to jump. I struck on the bottom of the yawl and slid off into the sea. When I came up and put out my arms to swim, I struck an oar in front of me. This saved me. With it I worked toward the shore, but there I had a fearful struggle. Eleven times the waves threw me up on shore, but the undertow was so strong it carried me back each time. My strength was about all gone. The twelfth time a large wave carried me farther up. I felt the moving sand under my feet, and, with the last remnant of strength, I dug both hands and feet into the sand with all my will, and just kept myself from being carried back again. I crawled up on the shore and rested. When I got up to look around, I saw a crack of light from the fire in this hut, and I staggered toward it.”

I summoned the rest of the crew, and we had tough work the rest of that night and for some days afterward.

But I was always apprehensive after this experience and it weighed on my mind. So in the spring I left the Beach, concluding that what I had heard and seen was enough for one lifetime.

THE MOWERS’ PHANTOM

In the eighties of the last century, on the sparsely settled old country road north of Yaphank, two mowers were arranging, one August evening, to go to the Beach next day, and cut the sedge upon a neighbor’s meadow. “We must make an ’arly start,” said Raner. “By sunrise we ought ’o be well through the [Gore in the Hills]. Arter wants that piece o’ sedge all laid to-morrer, ef we be men enough to do it.”

“How be you goin’ ’cross?” asked Layn.

“In the ol’ hay-boat. I got her ready at Squasux week ago yisterday. Josh Alibee is to meet us there, so there’ll be three on us, you see. A big day’s work, but we’ll take suthin’ along to brace us up while we’re doin’ on it.”

The sun next morning was not more than an hour high, when these mowers had embarked in the hay-boat for the Beach. The light breeze of that muggy August morning, blowing a trifle on the fore-quarter, carried them down the river so slowly that in order to gain time they plied the oar.

The scene which lay about them has changed but little in almost the hundred years which have passed since that morning. The river’s course to the Bay was just as zig-zag then as it is now. Eastward lay the same broad meadows, skirted by that dense barrier of foliage—the Noccomack woods. Westward there stood upon the river bank where the [Squasux] road came down, a long, low one-story house, and below this the meadows extended to the distant woodland. As the sunlight fell aslant upon these meadows, they presented all those lustrous gradations of yellow and brown that may be seen in the early sunlight of an August morning to-day.

“There, put away yer oar, Josh; the breeze stiffens,” said Raner, as they neared the mouth of the river.

“Thet ere’s warm work,” exclaimed Josh, as he finished the stroke and laid aside the oar. “I’ll tek a swaller, I believe.”

“No, no,” replied Layn; “put that jug back. It’s too ’arly in the day to begin swiggin’ at that. You’ll hev need o’ ev’ry drop o’ your share on the Beach.”

“A couple o’ swallers ’ill mek no diff’rence one way nur t’other. Not a sol’try horn hev I hed yet to-day, an’ I’ve pulled the hull way down the river, whilst you’ve sot thar, yer elbows on yer knees,” replied Josh, as he tipped the jug and drank.

“Pass it along,” said Raner. “Our ends hev all got to be kep’ even to-day.”

Raner and Layn each drank, though lightly, and passed the jug back to Josh, who, remarking, “It took all t’other swaller to wet my throat,” deliberately tipped the jug and drank continuously as he walked forward to put it in its place.

The hay-boat went slowly, and the time passed tediously to men who were ambitious to be at their day’s work. Of this Raner himself furnished the best evidence, as he stood by the tiller, treading from side to side, and knocking one foot against the other.

The present generation has little notion of what the sailing of those days was, particularly in the flat-bottomed, square-ended hay-boats. With a free wind, the course could be pretty well kept, but with the wind abeam, leeway became almost equal to headway, and wide calculations and allowances had always to be made. Layn had this in mind when he said, “Give the [Inlet] a wide berth or I’m afeard the tide’ll ketch us an’ draw us through.”

“She’ll clear it, an’ a plenty to spare,” replied Raner.

“You better not be too sure ’bout that. I, for one, don’t want ’o fare ez them Swan Crick fellers did.”

“What Swan Crick fellers?” enquired Raner.

“Why, Mott an’ a nother young feller—I dun know what his name wuz. Hain’t you heer’d ’bout ’em?”

“No.”

“Well, I hed ’em on my mind when I said, ‘Give the Inlet plenty o’ room.’ You ain’t heer’d on it, then? [Well], this ere young Mott and t’other feller started out the Crick to sail their hay-boat somewheres east o’ the Inlet. Ol’ man Mott hed built the boat, an’ hed put cleats on the edges under ’er sides, to keep ’er from slidin off to leward. She sailed smart, an’ hung on to the wind purty good, I b’lieve. The ol’ man, though, tol’ ’em to look out fur the Inlet, an’ give it a rattlin’ good distunce. But, by George, ’fore they knowed it, they wuz goin’ toward the Inlet. They tried might an’ main, puttin’ out poles an’ doin’ ev’ry thing they could, to steer’er to shore, but no use. They couldn’t reach bottom, fur she kep’ right squar’ inter the middle o’ the channel, an’ out she went.

“The poor devils wuz wild. The wind, what thar wuz on it, wuz blowin’ from the nuthard. They lowered sail, but out to sea they kep’ on goin’. Finely, arter they got out sev’ral mile, the wind changed to the suthard. They histed sail, pinted ’er straight on, an’ beached ’er on the surf-shore off abreas’ o’ Muriches, an’ the ol’ man went down thar an’ wracked the very boat he’d jist built.”

Josh, who had sat with his gun across his knees during Layn’s account of this mishap, now resumed the work of cleaning his gun, upon which he had put all his time since clearing the mouth of the river. Priming the musket, he raised it to his shoulder, took an imaginary aim, and remarked: “She’s in royal trim now fur any bunch o’ snipe thet shows up on the medder.”

“Where did you come upon that buster of a fire-arm?” inquired Layn, in jest.

“Thet ere fire-arm, le’ me tell you, hez been proved. She’s seen sarvice, but thet wuz afore I got ’er.”

“Hain’t she seen sarvice sence you’ve had ’er, ur plaguey nigh it?” continued Layn.

“Seen sa—ar—vice sence—I’ve—hed ’er?”

“Yes, by George, yes.”

“You’re talkin’ to me in riddles.”

“Why, Joshua,” broke in Raner, “hain’t there been orchards girdled, a barn burnt, an’ thirty horses made way with by some on you Punksholers not a great while back?”

“Exac’ly,” said Layn. “That ere hints the matter, Josh. Wuz that ere gun one on ’em that wuz drawn on [Judge Smith], an’ would a’ done the mischief on ’im, hedn’t his wife happened to keep atween him an’ the winder whilst he wuz ondressin’ a-goin’ to bed?”

“Thar wuzn’t but three on ’em at thet ere bus’ness, an’ is it your idee to hint thet I wuz one on em? Ef it be, thet’s hittin’ devlish nigh—devlish nigh; an’ I’m blasted ef I don’t tek thet up,” replied Alibee, spitting in his hands and stepping up to Layn.

“Nay, Joshua, nay; couldn’t that flint-lock a been there without you, or at any rate, afore you owned it?” spoke Raner, to pacify Alibee.

Layn discerned that he had gone too far in his attempt at accusation, and so in a bantering way, continued, “You said yer musket had seen sarvice. You wan’t in the Rev’lution’ry War, nur even in a skirmish. The wicked thing some o’ you Punksholers meant to do on Judge Smith is known to the hull Town, an’ you wuz a braggin’ ’bout the sarvice yer gun hed seen. What harm wuz thar, by George, in askin’ you, straight out an’ out, ef that wuz the sarvice she hed seen?”

“A devlish lot o’ harm, when a man wa’n’t thar, nur nowheres near thar, nur never hed an idee o’ bein’ thar,” replied Josh.

“Trim in the sail now, an’ quit your sq’abblin’,” spoke out Raner. “There, that’ll do. Now she p’ints up better, an’ ef she don’t slide off over much, we’ll make our landin’ spot without a tack. Ah! that’s a strong puff.”

Raner looked to windward thoughtfully a few minutes, and then began to whistle. The breeze, the onward motion of the boat, and the movement of the waves stirred his feelings, and he whistled on for a full half-hour.

As the craft approached the Beach, there came into view spots of meadow

“Where merry mowers, hale and strong,

Swept scythe on scythe their swaths along

The low green prairies of the sea.”

These scattered groups had been upon the meadows all night, ready to begin at sunrise the toil of the day. And toil it was too—toil that required an iron muscle and iron endurance. Yet, toil and moil though it were, beach-haying was always a welcomed season. It broke the monotony of farm life. There was the sail to and fro, the breeze from the sea in its first freshness, the beat of the surf, the wide view on every side, the visit to the ocean at night, and often a race with the slow-creeping tide to determine whether the mowers should lay their stint, or the water usurp their place.

The three mowers had made an early start and were in good season, but the sight of others at work roused their anticipations of the day’s labor, and Layn suggested, “Let’s give our scythes a thorer goin’ over. We’ll save time by it.”

They did this, and then Josh said to Raner, “Shell I put an edge on yer scythe?”

“No,” was the reply. “I’ll do that fur myself. You come aft an’ take the tiller.”

Over the ocean, low down on the horizon, lay a bank of fog. The mowers noticed this, and Raner remarked, “It may lay there all day, or it may clear away an’ be gone when the sun gits higher and the day warmer.”

“Thar’s no tellin’ nuthin’ ’bout what it’ll do, you’d better say,” replied Josh, with a laugh.

All along they had feared the wind would fail them when well over under the Beach. But it continued to blow; and in as good season as the mowers had hoped, they reached the meadows. Josh stood forward, anchor in hand, and jumping ashore, walked the full length of the cable and planted the anchor deep in the soft meadow soil. The old sail was quickly furled, and the three mowers, with scythes and traps, set out for Arter’s lot. Raner led the way, carrying, besides his scythe, a rake and hammer and wedges to hang anew the scythes, if need were. Layn was almost abreast of him, managing with some difficulty his scythe, a pitchfork, and a runlet of water; while Josh followed a short distance behind with the jug. Watching his chance, he lifted the jug and stole a draught.

“Le’ me see,” said Raner, approaching the place of their day’s work. “Accordin’ to the last division, the stake o’ every lot stands on the west side, an’ the numberin’s on the east side o’ the stake.”

A little examination showed which Arter’s lot was, and then Raner said, “We’ll strike in here.”

This was not the order to begin cutting, but for those immediate preparations which can be made nowhere else than on the exact spot. And so there followed driving of heel-wedges, twisting and ranging of blade with handle, stretching out of the foot to determine whether the scythe-point was too far out or too close in, and last, a stroke in the grass for final approval.

“We’re all ready, then, be we?” asked Raner. “Well, I’ll lead. Josh, you come arter me; an’ Layn’ll be last;” and getting into position, the lusty mowers struck their swaths. Regularly the graceful strokes fell, succeeded by the hitching step forward.

“Ah! my scythe’s doin’ purty work, I tell you,” remarked Raner. “How does your’n cut, Layn?”

“Royally.”

“An’ your’n, Alibee?”

“Never better.”

“We’re all well under way, then, an’ the grass’s in fair condition. Can we lay it by night, think you, Layn?”

“I guess so; but by King George, we’ve got ’o keep movin’, le’ me tell yer.”

“Alibee, can you stan’ it to keep ’er joggin’ all day long at this gait?”

“Thet’s what I come fur, I b’lieve, to do a day’s work with the rest on yer.”

There had been some sort of an understanding between Raner and Layn when driving to the landing, that Alibee, who was a loud boaster, should do such a day’s work as he had seldom done. It is easy, therefore, to see why Raner was so particular about assigning him the middle place. Raner and Layn were both excellent scythes-men, and with one to lead and the other to drive, Alibee must keep their pace all day.

Alibee, be it said, was not an energetic man. Some of his acquaintances called him a “blower.” Had he been hired to go to the Beach and take two men with him to cut a plot of grass, there would have been mowing done as a matter of course; but the day, nevertheless, would have passed easily enough. The bouts would have been short ones, with a spell of whetting at each end. There would have been halts here and there, while he looked to see how the grass lay ahead, and whether it was down much or tangled. And when such pretexts failed, Alibee would have found it encouraging to count just how many swaths had been cut, and calculate how many more remained to be done. At midday, too, a long nooning would have been taken, with likely a stroll to kill a mess of snipe. Let, however, a few months pass, and beach-haying become the topic of talk at a tavern gathering, and with what noisy bragging would Alibee recount what he and two others accomplished in two days last summer.

“There’s the first bout round,” remarked Raner, “an’ now whet up fur the next.”

“An’ wet up, too,” broke in Josh.

“Yes, yes,” seconded Layn; “a good horn all round.”

All drank; but Josh was last at the jug, and improved his opportunity.

Each man took up his scythe again, wiped the blade with a wisp of grass, and struck with drawing motion his rifle along the blade. Every blow sent out those ringing notes—the test of good steel.

The whetting over, zithe—zithe—zithe—went the scythes once more, the graceful strokes beating again their triple measure. But before the mowers had finished their second bout, the outposts of the fog, which lay banked low over the ocean when they were crossing the Bay, came and settled about them. So intent, though, were the mowers upon the work in hand, that the fog’s insidious presence was not noted, till making the last stroke out, they straightened up and looked around. They could not at first realize the change. When they had struck in at the other end of the swath, their view extended over miles—the wide Bay and the blue shore beyond, lay to the northward; west and east stretched the meadows with their sinuous edges; to the south were the Beach hills and the gap through them, affording a glimpse of the ocean. What wonder is it, then, that the mowers, bending down and watching intently to see where the next stroke should fall, lost consciousness of their surroundings, and were, the first instant on looking up, bewildered to see the impenetrable gray on all sides?

“Well, I sw’ar,” spoke Josh. “This ere’s sudden—I’ll be darned ef I knowed where I wuz for a second ur two.”

“Nuther did I,” replied Layn. “At fust, I tried to git my bearin’s, an’ it bothered me, fur thar wuzn’t no bearin’s to be got. Then I come to my senses, an’ knowed I wuz right here on the medder mowin’, with this ere bank o’ fog all round us.”

A fog, as everybody knows, plays all sorts of tricks with the judgment. A man may drive over a road a hundred times and think himself acquainted with every turn and hollow, with every clump of trees, with every bank, rock, or bunch of shrubbery by the roadside; but let a dense fog come down, and memory at once refuses to match the new impressions with the old. The hollows are deeper and the bends of the road more abrupt, the clump of trees has shifted its position or has entirely disappeared, and every rock and bunch of shrubbery becomes a strange object. If he begins to doubt, his judgment is completely upset, and he concludes he has taken the wrong road.

A man may have sailed from shore to shore of a body of water so often as to feel almost confident of doing it with eyes shut; let, however, a fog settle and blot out every surrounding object, and ten to one he will conclude, before he has sailed a mile, that he has not kept his course, or that the wind has shifted. Then it is all up with him; confusion and uncertainty follow, and there can be no telling where he will make land.

“What’s it goin’ to do, Raner?—hang here all day like this?” asked Layn.

“It acts to me, with this light wind a blowin’, as ef there’d be lots o’ fog adriftin’ all day. But fog or no fog,” replied Raner, “we mus’ keep a steppin’.”

At Raner’s suggestion the stroke was resumed, and the mowers gave no further heed to the fog whose mysterious depths had shut them in, and severed, as it seemed, all connection with the little world they knew.

Round and round they mowed, bout after bout, swinging their blades with the same lively stroke. For three hours Alibee stood the driving well, and then all of a sudden he broke out with, “This ’ere ain’t squar’—it’s urgin’ the thing a little too much. My scythe’s losin’ her edge; the ol’ rule is to whet at ev’ry corner, an’ drink at ev’ry round.”

“Well, ain’t we drunk at ev’ry round?” answered Layn; “an’ I took notice thet you swilled ez long ez any on us.”

“Thet I’ll ’low,” said Josh; “but we ain’t whet at ev’ry corner. Thet’s my p’int. Th’ ain’t nuthin’ much made, ez I kin see, by drivin’ so like the devil. You’ll wear me threadbare afore sundown, keepin’ me here in the middle. It’s the hardest place to mow in, by a darn sight.”

“Joshua,” said Raner, “I thought you Manor men wuz all such cracked mowyers. Here’s Layn an’ me, we’re only common mowyers, an’ you can’t keep your end up with us, hey?”

“Yes, I kin,” replied Josh; “but what’s the use o’ killin’ yerself. We can’t cut this ere medder to-day nohow, an’ I don’t see the use o’ workin’ hard ez you kin swing, an’ goin’ home middle to-morrer to do nuthin’ all the arternoon. By gosh,” he continued, sighing, as if partly exhausted, “I’m darned ef I don’t b’lieve some sort o’ contrivance could be rigged up to do this ere mowin’.”

“What sort o’ a contrivance, Josh?” quickly inquired Layn.

“Why, thar could be three ur four scythes hitched on to a post to swing round, an’ cut twice ez fast ez we’re doin’ on it. An’ one o’ these ere days some ere feller’ll rig up jist sich a machine.”

“Not in our day, Joshua,” laughed Raner.

“No, no; not in our day,” repeated Layn, joining in the laugh.

“Your laughin’ don’t ’mek no dif’runce. I tell ye, I b’lieve it’ll come yit.”

“Why don’t you try it yerself, ef yer so confident?” asked Layn.

“I’m bedarned ef I don’t b’lieve I could, ef I hed time, an’ tools, an’ all the traps thet’s wanted fur sich things. Them scythes, don’t ye see, could be rigged to go roun’ jist like thet;” and here Alibee cut a stroke to show what he meant. “Yes,” he went on, growing earnest over his vague idea, “you could rig jist about three strappin’ good scythes on to a post to swing roun’ jist ez easy ez thet;” and here again he cut a dashing stroke.

“What a cussed foolish idee that is, Josh,” spoke up Raner, a little vexed at the absurd notion. “How the devil, I’d like to know, would you make the post go?”

“Thet ere could be done somehow ur nuther. Thar’d be a way hit on, if a man taxed his noggin’ long enough,” replied Josh, hesitatingly.

Raner and Layn again both heartily laughed, and Josh said nothing more upon the subject. Whether, though, it was his remonstrance, or whether Raner thought they would thereby be able to cut more grass, he gave word at the next corner to stop and whet. This change put Josh in better spirits, for when the whetting was finished, he remarked, “Thar’s only jist one thing a lackin’, and thet’s the jug. Ef thet ere jug could only foller us roun’, we couldn’t ask no more.”

“Ef it did,” said Layn, “you’d be all the time a guzzlin’.”

“I ain’t no bigger guzzler than you be,” retorted Josh.

The morning wore on, and it seemed to Alibee that noon would never come. Every stroke went against his will. At one time he was on the point of deserting, and leaving Raner and Layn there to drive each other; but seeing how dense the fog was, and remembering he had no other way of getting off the Beach than to walk three or four miles east to the groups of mowers they had passed in the morning, and fearing that he might get lost should he attempt this—a thought which made him shudder—he held himself in control. The fog at this time was so thick that one could not distinguish an object four rods away, and the impossibility of measuring with the eye what had been cut, and what yet remained of the plot apportioned for the morning, was disheartening to Alibee. To his mind it seemed an endless cutting in a prison of fog. If, however, he had lost calculation and had thereby become dispirited, the plot was lessening just as rapidly as if in full view from start to finish. And shortly after midday, the mowers walked up the last narrow strip, leaving the morning’s stint all laid.

“Now fur a chance at what victuals we fetched along. You go to the hay-boat, Josh, arter our pails, while Layn an’ me heap up some o’ this grass to set on whilst we’re eatin’.”

“Gi’ me a swaller fust,” replied Alibee; and after satisfying his thirst, he started for the hay-boat.

Ten minutes passed, and out of the fog came a voice, “Which way be yer? How fur be I frum the boat?”

“This way o’ you, an’ to the nuthard,” replied Raner. “Don’t you hear the surf to suthard o’ you?”

Groping about a little longer, he found the boat and soon came out of the fog with the dinner pails.

The mowers, to state it as they would, lost no time in falling to. Their fare was plain—plainer, indeed, than was usual at home. But though plain, the labor near the sea had whet their appetites, and they ate with keener relish than at their own tables. Then, too, the jug came in and played its part rather more freely than it would have done at home. They talked of the morning’s work, and discussed the probabilities of cutting the rest of the meadow that afternoon and getting away for home before sundown.

“We ain’t laid but little more’n a third on it,” remarked Layn. “It’s my opinion we’ll hev to stay here on the Beach all night, an’ cut the balance ’arly to-morrer mornin’. Then, ef thar’s any wind, we kin reach Squasux landin’ middle forenoon.”

“Thet’s the idee exac’ly,” replied Josh. “Tek it easy this arternoon, quit work arly, an’ I’ll hev a chance to git a bunch o’ snipe. We kin git home at noon to-morrer at thet rate, jist ez easy ez you kin toss up yer hat.”

“What ’o you say ’bout it, Raner?” asked Layn.

“Well, I wanted to git off to-night, but ef we’re goin’ to do it, we’ve got to cut faster this arternoon then we hev this mornin’,” replied Raner.

A half hour was all the time taken for dinner. Layn carried the pails back to the boat, and the mowers finished their rest by whetting their scythes carefully, giving them a keener edge than they would take time for in the midst of work.

“Ef we’re all ready fur work ag’in,” said Raner, “we’ll cut in this d’rection this arternoon. Down here an’ up ag’in on the west side o’ the lot, ef we kin see where the west side o’ the lot is.”

Alibee fell into his old place without a word of complaint. Raner began with the stroke he had maintained all day, but it was evident that Alibee intended to make his stroke in slower time, while Layn was not so anxious to drive him as he had been throughout the morning.

An hour passed, and Raner, after pacing over what yet remained uncut, remarked, “We can’t poke along in this way, ef we’ve got any idee o’ layin’ this piece afore night. We come on here to cut, an’ fur my part, I want to git done and hev it over with.”

“This ’ere’s good ’nough,” replied Josh. “Let it go et this.”

The wind, they noticed, was blowing stronger, and the fog began to sweep past them in dense scuds, at times suddenly growing thin as if about to clear away. Occasionally a yellowish tinge overhead gave indications that the sun had almost broken through, but presently a thick scud would come and shut the mowers in again. Thus, with fantastic behavior, the fog came and went. Two or three times, when it came the thickest, and darkened rapidly about them, they broke their stroke and looked around.

“Fust it’s dark an’ close, then it’s lighter, then it’ll come in agin thick, an’ then, the nex’ thing, the sun all but breaks through it. What a witchin’ sort o’ an arternoon it is,” said Layn.

“I’d a darned sight ruther it ud gether itself up an’ shower. Then thar’d be some likelihood o’ the sun’s comin’ out an’ dryin’ on it up,” replied Josh. “This ere thick an’ thin, dark an’ light, I don’t like. Raner,” he continued, “you couldn’t a picked a wuss day.”

“I never knowed sech a day afore in my life,” spoke Layn. “Miles o’ this fog has been runnin’ by us all day long, an’ this arternoon it’s a loomin’ itself up an’ meltin’ away ag’in in all kinds o’ shapes.”

The long swaths they were now mowing lay in direction to and from the ocean, and the place where the bouts ended and the indispensable jug stood in readiness, chanced to be so situated with reference to the gap between the hills that it afforded a view directly out upon the sea. The nature of the fog made this view more or less indistinct, at times shutting it entirely out of sight. Here the wind would bank up the fog, twist it into fantastic shapes, and blow them all away, only to summon more of the pliant medium and heap it up again into more grotesque masses. The mowers, dull as their perception was, at last saw this, and it wrought upon their minds. The feeling kept coming up that the appearances which the fog assumed through the gap were due to some kind of witchcraft. All the superstitious stories they had ever heard about the Beach vividly recurred to them, and these idle tales now assumed the very force of truth; and so they approached each time the spot that opened up the view, with increasing dread. They slighted their whetting at this corner, and would not have stopped at all had the jug been elsewhere. Alibee’s apprehensions that what he had seen through the gap boded evil to them, were the first to get the upper hand of him, and suddenly stepping ahead and cutting the first stroke, he broke out, “By thunder, gi’ me a chance to lead once. I’m darned ef I’m going to stay on this ere Beach to-night, nohow.”

Raner and Layn were startled by this sudden freak of Alibee’s, but they fell into line and followed with quicker stroke than they had heretofore made. Alibee proved himself equal to the place he had assumed, and the next corner was quickly reached. Here the whetting was done with new energy, and the scythes flew again.

“Keep ’er up, Josh,” urged Layn; “we’re hard on ter you. I ain’t got a bit more notion then you hev o’ stayin’ on here all night.”

They came round again to the dreaded corner. Alibee grated his teeth as he thought of it, and his breathing was hard enough to be heard by the others. Coming out first and looking seaward, the very thought he intended not to mention slipped from his control, and he spoke out, “Thar she is ag’in.” But recovering himself to some extent, he turned quickly about and continued, “Layn, you lead this time. Then it’ll fall ekal on all on us. Ev’ry man’s got a dif’runt stroke, an’ ef he leads once, mows in the middle once, an’ follers once, he gits a chance one time ev’ry three, to swing his nat’rul stroke.”

Stepping to the jug he took it up and, shaking it, resumed, “I swar, we ain’t got but ’bout one good horn apiece, and thet puts us in a hell-sight wuss fix then we’re in now.”

They drained the jug to the last drop, and bent again to their work. The pace they were keeping was exhausting, but they never slackened. Another bout was finished within a dozen strokes, when Layn burst out, “Here we come ag’in to thet blasted gap. My blamed eyes won’t keep away from it whenever we git roun’ here.”

“You’ve seen it, then, hev yer?” asked Josh.

“Hang it, yes,” replied Layn; “an’ I’ve tried not to, fur three times now.”

“So hev I, an’ I seem hell-bent to look thet way whenever I git roun’.”

Raner said not a word. It was his turn to lead, and he started in without suffering the talk to go further. They were working to the utmost of their strength. Layn and Alibee cut wider swaths than at any previous time. They reached the end, and Layn said, “Raner, you go to t’other end, an’ roun’ thet corner, so we kin mow by thar without stoppin’. Josh an’ me’ll cut across this ere end, so’s not to lose no time.”

Raner complied; but the others noticed that instead of returning the instant he had accomplished the purpose, he stood a moment and looked out through the gap.

When he returned, Layn could not refrain from asking, “Did you see it?”

“Yes,” replied Raner, “an’ I swar I don’t like it.”

They plunged into work again with greater determination. It was in this way they kept their courage up; for every time they stopped to whet, their feelings were in a turmoil. The very pace they were working put them in all the worse condition. But the plot was lessening rapidly, and so they drove themselves on. Strange to say, some time passed without a word further in allusion to what had been seen. But while there was for this short period a dogged spell upon them to say nothing more about what each was sure the other had seen, the very bugaboo in their minds made all the more headway because of their silence; and in spite of themselves, they kept glancing through the gap, when they cut across the end where the empty jug lay. The expedient of curving that end did not dispel their alarm, for when they rounded the broad curve, some sinister influence impelled them to look seaward.

“She’s fog color,” abruptly exclaimed Josh, startling both Layn and Raner, and causing them to look at the same instant. “She’s got ev’ry stitch spread, too.”

“An’ still headin’ right squar’ on, I sw’ar,” said Layn. And pointing, he continued, “Raner, do you see? We ain’t got no sich breeze a blowin’ here ez she’s got thar.”

“What the hell’s dif’runce, tell me, does that make with her? That wizard o’ a ship ’ud have fair wind an’ plenty on it, ef she wuz sailin’ dead to wind’ard.”

“Now, she’s gone ag’in,” spoke Alibee, “an’ thet’s what she’s done afore.”

The mowers began a new bout, and Raner remarked, “Such things, hell take ’em, have been seen afore, though a long time back. I heerd tell on ’em when I wuz a boy. It’s a spectre o’ some ship Kidd has sunk with all her crew on board, a ha’ntin’ this coast. Thar’s no tellin’ what the mischief’ll come out on it all to us, ne’ther. He wuz off the Inlet thar sev’ral times with the ‘Royal Eduth.’ I’ve hearn, time and ag’in, o’ how he come in the Inlet with his long-boat, an’ got game o’ the Injuns, an’ the devil may know how many lives he put an end to when off here.”

The mowers came again to the bout leading up to the broad curve. Alibee, who a moment ago had said, “I’m all o’ a cold sweat,” looked out upon the ocean and exclaimed, “By the very devil himself, see how much nigher she’s in! Confound ef I want ’o stay here an’ cut much longer.”

This exclamation produced but one result—a wider swath. They had plunged into deeper stroke that afternoon after every expression of fear, for the mowers tried, in the prodigious effort put forth, to drown, for the moment, their apprehensions. But the drafts they had made upon their strength were now telling upon them sorely. They could not sustain the effort, and soon lapsed into a slower stroke; and although the bout was considerably shorter, they were a third longer in cutting it. Though wrought to the highest point with fear, they were powerless to resist the bewitching influence to look seaward as they mowed round the curve. This time that strange shape, looming up again, struck terror through them.

“By heavens,” gasped Alibee, “how much closer in is she a comin’? An’ look! look! thet’s a woman standin’ on the rail thar, for’ard, white ez the ship. Not another soul on board, ez I kin see.”

The mowers stood gazing a second with scythes poised, and then finished their strokes. Just around the curve Alibee stole a glance behind him. With piercing tone he cried, “Good God! thar’s thet woman, on the hills yunder, comin straight fur us; an’ the ship, look! she’s bow on. Quick, quick, run fur the hay-boat.”

Hurriedly they gathered their traps and ran to the boat, casting looks behind every few steps. They had left the jug—the empty jug—but not a second could be lost. They threw their scythes into the boat, Alibee ran for the anchor, and came running back with it, dragging the cable after him. Raner and Layn in their excitement had already pushed off the boat, and Josh, splashing through the water, tumbled on board, anchor in hand. In an instant the mowers had disappeared in the fog.

ENCHANTED TREASURE

Purty nigh a hull week that ship hed been seen manoovrin’ outside the Beach. Fust, she’d ’pear to be purty well in, an’ then she’d be way off a’most out o’ sight; an’ so it went, off an’ on, off an’ on. The neighbors—thar wa’n’t many on ’em, the houses bein’ scatterin’—hed seen ’er; an thar wuz a good deal o’ conjectur ’bout what she could be doin’. Nobody could tell. Thar wusn’t no war—ef that hed ’a been, ’twouldn’t ’a been ’tall puzzlin’ what she wur a-manoovrin’ at on the coast. On a Friday arternoon she dis’peared, an’ nothin’ wuz seen o’ her on a Saturday. Sunday mornin’ arly, I looked over to the Beach, but didn’t see anythin’ o’ the ship. She’d gone fur good, we concluded.

Long middle forenoon, John an’ me made up our minds to go to the Beach. It wuz hossfootin time, an’ that night wuz full moon. We put up suthin’ to eat, an’ told the folks to hum that we wuz goin’, an’ didn’t calc’late to be back till long towards nex’ mornin’.

Our plan wuz to sail over, saunter long the Beach that arternoon, an’ ’bout nightfall git a pen ready to put the hossfeet in, an’ when the moon wuz up an’ the tide flood, ketch all the hossfeet we could. That’s the best time o’ the month to ketch ’em—full moon and flood tide. Hossfeet, you know, crawl up in pairs on to the shore at the height o’ the flood. You wade along an’ find ’em in the edge o’ the water; throw ’em up onto shore high and dry, an’ stick their tails into ground. They’re fast, then. You got to work quick, ’cause the nick o’ the tide don’t stay on long. It’s git all you kin afore they go off. When they’re gone, you kin take your own time in loadin’ ’em into the boat, ur puttin’ ’em into pen till you kin take ’em off.

John an’ me intended to put ’em in a pen, let ’em be thar till we could bring on the scow to load ’em into, and then tow ’em off. One year we got purty nigh three thousan’ hossfeet in one night. It’s excitin’ work to wade along, lookin’ close to see ’em, fur the water’s dark an’ they’re dark; ur else hittin’ ’em with your feet, an’ then reachin’ to find ’em. You got to be more’n car’ful, though, ’bout one thing, an’ that’s not to git their tails stuck into yer feet ur hands. Ef you do, an’ it goes in deep, ten chances to one you’re a “goner.”

Well, John an’ me expected to mek a big haul that night. We went down to the [landin’], an’ fussed ’roun’ thar, gittin’ the old skiff ready. We warn’t in any hurry, fur we hed all day afore us. ’Twur one o’ them shiny, quiet June days, an’ it bein’ Sunday made it ’pear all the more so.

The Bay wuz ez blue ez could be—the water wuz becomin warm—that’s what made it blue. Thar wuz only a little mite o’ wind, jist enough to fill the sail.

I remember that sailin’ ez plain ez if it all happened yisterday. I steered part o’ the way, then John took hold, an’ I stretched myself out in the skiff. The sun shun warm—that kind o’ pleasant warmth that you wanted to let soak in an’ in.

The skiff slid for’ard easy—no tuggin’ an’ jumpin’; the waves—the water wuz only roughened a little—rippled an’ slapped up alongside, soundin’ holler to me in the bottom of the skiff, an’ the water bubbled aroun’ the rudder—that’s ’bout all thar wuz to it, but somehow I could ’a sailed on for a fortni’t.

The tide wuz low when we got across, but we had no diffikilty to git close to the medder, ez John steered up into a dreen. We took out the mast, rolled the mutton-leg sail round it, an’ drawed the skiff up into the grass. Then we eats somethin’, put the rest o’ our victuals away till night, an’ went over to the surf shore. Thar we set down a short spell, jist ez ev’rybody does, I guess, when they go over to the ocean an’ have a plenty o’ time to spar’, ez we hed. Fin’ly we begun our walk ’long shore to see what we could find.

This ere walk ’long shore wuz one reason why we’d come over to the Beach in the forenoon. I don’t remember how fur we walked, but we sauntered along an hour or so—the sun wuz quite a piece to the west—when all on a sudden John p’inted off shore an’ says, “Jess, look-a-thar. What do you mek o’ that? Thar she is ag’in standin’ right onto shore.”

“That’s her,” says I; “that’s the same ship, an’ she ain’t a-beatin’ nuther, with the wind this way.” I somehow kind o’ felt that that ship wuzn’t standin’ close in fur no good puppose, and I didn’t care to be in sight on-shore, ez thar hed been no end o’ strange things done on that Beach fust an’ last. I thought quick o’ what, accordin’ to all accounts, hed happened in my granther’s days, an’ even thirty year back, in my father’s, so I says agin to John, “Come, let’s git up in the hills out o’ sight.”

In less ’an no time, we slipped round the hills, climbed up one on ’em to where we could jist peek over, an’ laid down. The ship kep’ a comin’. She didn’t seem to change her course by a yard’s breadth. Ev’ry sail wuz spread an’ pullin’, an’ I tell you she wur a purty sight to look at.

’Fore long, John says, “Jess, that vessel’s got some puppose, an’ we’d better go east.”

So we scooted ’long behind the hills, an’ ev’ry low gap atween the hills we come to, we’d stop car’ful an’ look out to see ef the ship kep’ on the same course. Ev’ry time we looked out, she wuz nigher an’ nigher. When we’d got a stretchin’ good piece east we didn’t run any further, but crawled up a low hill to take a good look-out agin. By this time, the ship wur pretty well in. Afore long, she rounded up into the wind, clewed up her squarsails, an’ anchored.

“What’re they doin’ now, John?” I asked; “kin you mek out?”

“Lowerin’ a yawl, it looks like to me,” he says.

An’ so they wuz. In a short time the yawl pushed out from the ship, an’ then I could see plain enough what it wuz, an’ that some on the ship’s crew wuz comin’ ashore in that ere yawl.

We hunted round fur a place to hide, ’cause we knowed they couldn’t be a-comin’ ashore fur water. There wuzn’t no water to be got. Behind us wuz a clump o’ cedars purty thick, so we run ’long a windin’ holler, an’ crep’ up into that bunch o’ low cedars. When we looked out, the yawl wuz behind the hills; but purty soon it come into range near shore, an’ disappeared ag’in, fur the way on it wuz, thar wur a small gap ’tween the hills that give us this sight o’ the yawl. Arter the yawl got across that gap, we waited a long time—I tell you it wuz long—afore we see anythin’ more on ’em. We got scared a-waitin’; fur how could we tell but what they wuz mekin’ towards us? While I’d got sort o’ tired a-strainin’ an’ lookin’ here an’ thar, an’ fell to conject’rin’ what under the sun wuz goin’ to turn out on it all, John says all on a sudden, “Jess, look, thar’s one on ’em on yunder hill.”

I looked quick, and thar stood a sailor with a spy-glass searchin’ in ev’ry d’rection. We crouched flat, scratchin’ our hands an’ face in gittin’ under the branches near ground. We’d a been layin’ down all the time, but a spy-glass is purty fur-sighted, an’ we knowed it, so we crawled under the branches to be all the more out o’ sight.

In jist about three minutes the sailor wuz gone. Then we hed another time o’ fearin’ what ’ud come next, but soon some men ’peared on the top o’ the hill. Thar wuz five on ’em. I breathed hard, an’ so did John, till we see they wurn’t comin’ towards us. They wuz carryin’ somethin’ heavy, ez they’d stop, set it down, an’ take turns. An’ when they changed what they wuz carryin’, they changed shovels. They hed shovels with ’em, for these we could see plain enough.

These five men went onwards to a hill in the middle of the Beach—the highest hill within sev’ral miles—an’ stopped on the side o’ it toward the ocean. They stopped a long while an’ ’peared to be takin’ certain ranges. Fin’ly they begun to dig. Ev’ry single one o’ the five wur a-diggin’. The bank o’ course kep’ a growin’, and got so high, ur the hole got so deep, I dun know which, that we couldn’t see ’em any longer a-diggin’. Nex’ they all come out, took what they hed fetched with ’em, and put it into the hole. Then thar wuz a long halt—all on ’em down in the hole. Not one on ’em wuz seen fur a long time. That time they wuz out o’ sight so long that John proposed to skulk to our boat.

But I says, “No, we wun’t run no risks.”

He wuz afeard, an’ so wuz I. We hadn’t even our old flint-locks with us. They would a’boostered up our courage consid’rable. I wuz right, though, ’bout stayin’ where we wuz. We shouldn’t a hed time to get halfway to our boat, ’fore they come up out o’ the hole, an’ begun to shovel the sand in agin. I couldn’t mek out but four shov’lin’, but I never thought much on it at fust. When the hole, though, got purty nigh full—you could sort o’ tell by the banks—I couldn’t then mek out but four men. I strained an’ looked till there wuz dark spots a-swimmin’ ’fore my eyes, and then I whispered to John—for we wuz to the wind’ard on the men—sayin’, “John, how many do you mek out a-shov’lin’?”

“Four,” says he, “only four, an’ I been countin’ ’em agin an’ agin.”

“That’s all I kin mek out uther. Didn’t five on ’em come ashore?”

“I know thar wuz five,” says John; “I see them five jist ez plain ez I see them ere four now. I counted five on ’em in two dif’runt places.”

The hole wuz filled, they spatted on the sand with their shovels—that ere made me all the time think o’ buryin’ somebody—an’ then them four sailors went back to the yawl.

John an’ me waited and watched another long, tejus time—I suppose they wuz a-waitin fur the best chance to git their yawl through the surf. It’s easier to come on, you know, than it is to git back agin.

Through that ere gap ’tween the hills, though, we see the yawl ez they rowed off to the ship, and we breathed consid’rable easier. Anchor wuz huv up, the sails unclewed, an’ the ship tacked off to suth’ard.

The days is long that time o’ year, an’ it wuz well onto sundown afore the ship got under way. When we see she wuz headin’ off, we made fur our skiff.

We gin up all idee o’ hossfootin’ that night. It wuz too bad to leave the Beach, but we hed no mind to stay thar. We wuz mighty afeard, you see, an’ thar’s no use o’ denyin’ it—the thoughts o’ what become o’ that fifth man wuz boogerish; so we put for hum.

It would ’a been one o’ the very best nights for hossfootin’. The tide wuz high, an’ the moon come up over the Beach big an’ full; but the Beach lay all dusky an’ dark under the moon, an’ the night seemed owly. We laid our course straight across. It wurn’t pleasant sailin’, though, ez it hed been in the mornin’; fur the waves kep’ mekin’ moanin’ noises an’ guggling’s all ’round the boat. I wuz chilly, an’ my feelin’s crawled over me, and kep’ crawlin’ over me till we got to the landin’.

The folks wuz su’prised to see us. We got hum ’bout bed-time, an’ told at once what we’d seen; an’ instid o’ gittin’ off to bed ’arly, ez we al’ays did Sunday nights to git a good start Monday mornin’—instid o’ gittin’ off to bed, we all sot up an’ talked a long spell about it.

When I went to bed I couldn’t go to sleep, ’cause I kep’ thinkin’ over the hull matter. That day an’ that ere bright night hev al’ays seemed to me jist like two days into one. Thar wurn’t any daybreak, fur the moonlight wuz ez bright ez daylight, an’ you couldn’t tell when one went an’ another come. I s’pose though, arter all, that wuz a nat’rul thing in June, when the sun rises ’arliest in the year; but I never noticed it afore ur sence.

Two ur three days arterward, some o’ the neighbors stopped to the house in the edge o’the ev’nin’, an’ mongst other things that wuz talked over wuz that ere ship; fur, you see, she hed been noticed by all the people o’ that section the week afore, an’ now she wuz gone—nothin’ more’d been seen o’ her. I told what John an’ me hed seen, an’ so the story got afloat. All summer long, way into fall, neighbors an’ people livin’ quite a distance away would stop and ask me ’bout it—full a dozen men from the middle o’ the Islan’ stopped, fust an’ last, to ask me if it twan’t the same ship some o’ their mowers see, one foggy day six weeks later on, when they wuz on the Beach cuttin’ salt hay. Winter nights, we now an’ then would git to talkin’ it over ’round the fireplace. Well, time went on, an’ young people ez they growed up would ask me to tell it to them.

I’ve told it a good many times—a good many times. You see, it wur over fifty year ago sence it happened.

“Did anybody go to the spot an’ see what wuz buried thar?”

Some dare-devils from away West somewheres tried to dig thar. They took a clear night with only a little wind a-blowin’ an’ a few clouds afloat, but when they got fairly to work, it grew pitch dark, an’ foggy, ez quick ez a candle goes out. The air got so thick they couldn’t scarcely breathe, an’ then a skel’ton ghost with a dagger in its hand, that hed some kind o’ pale flame creepin’ an’ burnin’ on the blade, ’peared right above ’em. It stood a minute an’ shook the dagger, an’ then begun to move ’round ’em, comin’ nearer an’ nearer, till the men run headlong fur their boat, shakin’ cold, they wuz so scared.

I heerd one on ’em say, ten year arter, that that wuz the only time in all his life his hair ever stood on end.

But nobody round here never dug thar. They never even probed thar. They never tried the min’rul rod thar nuther, ez they did sometimes in other spots. Ev’rybody roun’ this ere part o’ the Islan’ knowed better. The treasure buried thar wuz enchanted treasure. Nobody meddles with enchanted treasure that knows what enchanted treasure is.

“What made it enchanted?”

That fifth man wuz a pris’ner they’d taken frum some ship they’d run down, robbed, an’ destroyed with the rest on the crew. They’d got ready to come ashore to bury treasure, an’ they ordered him to go long with ’em to help do it. He went, doin’ his part o’ the work jist ez ef he wur one o’ the gang.

They go ashore, mek up their minds ’bout the spot, take their ranges so they kin come back to the spot when they want to, an’ then begin to dig. When the hole is dug deep enough, they set the treasure into the hole, an’ all stan’ in thar aroun’ it. The leader o’ the gang tells the pris’ner that he’s got to stay by that ere treasure an’ guard it, so nobody kin ever git it but them.

They mek him sw’ar with some kind o’ an oath that he will. Then they mek way with him, an’ put his body over the treasure.

That’s why we couldn’t mek out no more ’an four men goin’ back when five come ashore. Them four men murdered the fifth one, an’ in so doin’ enchanted the treasure.

It wuz sealed in human blood, an’ the devil himself wuz thar in full charge. An’ that’s why thunder an’ lightnin’ comes, an’ spectres is seen, an’ the treasure sinks lower an’ lower, an’ the hole caves, when people hev tried to dig up enchanted treasure. An’ that’s why, too, so little buried treasure hez ever been found, ’cause pirates mos’ al’ays enchant it, an’ sometimes enchant it double. They murder their pris’ners, an’ bury ’em, knife in hand, settin’ on the treasure to guard it.

THE MONEY SHIP

Seventy years ago two boys, one seven years old and the other twelve, made a trip with their father up the Great South Bay. They had been promised that when it became necessary to land and mend the nets, they might run across the Beach to the ocean.

So, one afternoon when the nets were spread, away the boys scampered, dragging their outstretched hands through the tall grass. But coming upon a damp spot of meadow when a third of the way over, they were obliged to turn their course. In doing so, they chanced to look behind them, and seeing how far they were from the boat and how small it appeared, they were afraid, and had half a mind to turn back. But the younger lad caught sight of the large, leafy stalks of a great rose mallow, a few steps ahead, spreading the broad petals of its passionate flower out to the sun and the breeze.