From one of these, in that old Dutch house, a stepladder, permanently fixed, led out on the leads to a flat place about six feet square. Right in front of this rose a massive stack of chimneys. No one outside, down below, would have suspected the existence of that square "coigne of vantage."

Now on the flat side the edges of the chimneystack had been splayed off, or bevelled, leaving a space of about a foot as a point for observation between the chimney-stack and the roof that rose on either side of it. The men who built that mansion knew well what they were about. From the flat square of leads those two bevelled-out spaces gave the looker-out a complete survey seawards and landwards. Securely screened from view, as it was the highest house in the district, gazing seawards, he overlooked, first, the long street leading down to the flushing sluice. Beyond the street stood the quays, the warehouses, and farther on the shipping. Past these his eye lighted on the sea-wall, the creek, and the marshes, with the Isle of Sheppy and the open sea in the distance. Any boat coming up the creek from open water was visible to him, and a signal given could be distinctly understood if he used a

glass; there was a rest fixed on each side of the chimney-stack for that purpose.

The view landward commanded all the roads that led into Marshton, or out of it. Nothing could be more perfect as a point of observation.

This was a delightful retreat for our invalid. Whenever the weather was congenial his friends carried him up there, and, supported by pillows, he sat for hours in his large chair, where he dozed and dreamed away the time, unless Scoot or Winder was beside him. At that height the noises of the lower world were softened, and the air was cooler and purer. His two friends were the only lads ever allowed to go up to the top of the house with him. Their respective fathers knew all the secrets of that dwelling, and the lads dared not have told anything pertaining to their parents' business transactions. They dared not have faced the penalties for so doing. Wonderful stories, however, did Scoot and Winder pour into Den's ears of what they had heard whispered by their fathers and grandfathers of scenes that had taken place, in which the space on the leads had figured significantly; of dark and stormy nights, they told, when a flash of fire had been seen to rise

above and at the sides of that old chimney-stack just as the fishing-folk were going home to bed. And then, how between one and two in the morning, horses at top speed had been heard coming down the street, with the sound of round oaths and pistol-shots intermingled. After that a second flash had come up from the house-top, and the next moment horsemen at full tear had dashed round the house, crossed the garden, and made for the low wall of the mill-pond. Splash after splash had been heard by the miller's men who were at work inside the mill that night, before all had vanished no one knew whither. But no sooner were they out of ear-shot than other horsemen were heard coming up; and, as they turned the corner, those who had caught a glimpse of them saw that they were excise officers.

The colour would fly to Den's pale cheeks as he listened to the yarns of the older lads; and health came back to his fever-wasted frame with the sun and the breezes that played on the roof tiling and the leads of the hospitable home of his mother's kinsfolk.

M

CHAPTER XVII.

SOME OLD SEA-DOGS.

DEN'S sojourn in the old Dutch house, and the boys' yarns, bring us to a chapter in these truthful annals of an old-world fishing village, relating to some of the old salts of Marshton, and a romance connected with one who was for many years their foremost leader.

November had come in rough -"werry rough," the old people said. The harbour was crowded with craft-schooners, brigs, and fishing-boats—that had run in from sea when the storm was coming on. Threatenings of what was on the way had been heard for a day or two. Folks who live by the sea know well the meaning of those mysterious sounds that come from no man knows where, and pass away

over the surface of the deep. The water-birds also had indicated plainly by their cries and their actions that the only safe course was to run in for shelter on the first harbour-tide. The divers cry and wail, for they know well how they will be put about when the storm comes in all its wild fury; their fishing-banks will be mere masses of fierce, boiling quicksands. Woe betide the craft that runs on to one of these, she will soon be in a sorry plight! A vessel will strike and break up in pieces like a match-box, amid the sands in weather such as this.

The gulls had come inland in flocks, covering the marshes and fields on some of the upland farms like rooks. Great poplars bent as fishing-rods when the fierce gusts swept over the flats, tearing some of them up by the roots, and causing the lonely marsh folks, thinly scattered here and there in the more sheltered spots, to look well at their reed-thatched roofs and narrow leadlight windows. Glass being dear in those days, and many of their dwellings miles away from any town, smashed - in windows meant money, of which valuable commodity they had but little.

They said heavy weather was coming up, and told all they met on the flats whose stock was out to