soon forgotten; and Denzil's happiness was complete when, from a pool in the Saltings-the name given to the strip of land running between the seawall and the tide from a pool surrounded by sea. blite and bents, a solitary curlew rose, one of a flock: it had pitched there whilst the main body of birds were to be heard and seen screaming and wheeling round, showing the white parts of their plumage in the bright sunlight.

The little lad was speechless with delight.

Arrived at their crabbing-ground, the two elder boys were soon absorbed in the process. The strings were unwound from the sticks, and a piece of meat was tied firmly on the end of the string and thrown. into the water, where it was quickly seized by the ferocious crabs. Just as quickly these were pulled up and shaken off into the basket; in a short time the boys had as many there as they could conveniently carry. Winding up the lines on their sticks, they made ready to start home.

"Where's Reed-bird?" cried Scoot. In their exciting occupation they had forgotten their little mate for a time.

With startled looks they dashed over the flat in

B

terror both well knew the treacherous nature of the marshes, and what had happened there more than once, within their own short memories.

They had not far to go, however; for in a shallow pool, which had fortunately a bottom of hard slub, they found Denzil up to his knees in water and covered with drift-weed.

"How came ye there, Reed-bird?" asked Winder in consternation.

"I thought ye was drownded, Den," said Scoot.

"But his coat an' his coller! My sakes! Reedbird, wunt ye git a quiltin' this time. What got yer inter that?"

"I see a Jack Her'n, and I jest pitched in," said the child.

They helped him out, and cleaned him to the best of their ability; picked up their crabbin' sticks and hamper, and returned home more soberly than they had started out.

"I say, Reed-bird," said Winder anxiously, more than once, as they plodded along, "do you think it 'ull be a werry bad 'un this time? What'll ye do when ye gits home?"

"Git quilted," was the stoic reply.

"Shel we go in with yer, Den, an' tell 'em ye've jest bin down the maʼsh like, an' hed an accident?" "No, you git to yer own homes; I'll be all right." "Well, if ye sez so; but, Den, we shan't bile none of these 'ere crabs till we sees ye, squalls or no squalls. An' ef ye don't heave in sight ter-morrow they'll keep another day."

Denzil turned up the long street and made for his home as fast as he could. He felt sure of being punished, but he had had a very happy afternoon, and the remembrance of it would help him to bear what was likely to follow.

"After all, my things is dry now," he said to himself, looking ruefully down on his clothes that had been so carefully brushed by his mother in the morning, "an' there's no slub-marks on me, but she'll know I've bin where I hadn't ought."

CHAPTER III.

THE HOUSE ON THE MARSH.

THE quaint old market-place had been built on the highest point of Marshton, which was situated itself on what might be termed a huge hillock rising out of the low-lying surrounding marshlands. It had only one long irregular street, which ran over this hillock, beginning at the shore on one side, and coming back to it on the other. All the houses were old, and most of them had gables projecting from the upper storeys over the rough stony pavement. They were quartered with massive oak timber, each house after a different design, as though the inmates had sought to please and suit their own individual tastes. They were mostly very well built, comfortable and warm-an important consideration,

lying as the town did exposed to the strong winds from all sides. In a line along the water's edge were more imposing edifices, a few fine large houses, some warehouses and wharves. These had originally been the dwellings and houses of business of Dutch merchants, for a number of these had settled in the ancient fishing-town of Marshton.

In Holland, as Sir William Temple states in his 'Miscellanea,' published in the seventeenth century, there had, up to this time, been "above thirty acts of state bearing on the curing, salting, and barrelling of herrings alone, with such severity in the imposition and execution and penalties that the business grew to be managed with habitual skill, care, and honesty, so that there was hardly any example of failing in that line.”

The Dutch emigrants brought with them a better system of fishing than had been practised before on our coast. They it was also who built most of the massive sea - wall, and constructed the noted duck decoy near Marshton, of which the folks were justly proud; and where only bare hillocks, swamps, and tide-worn gullies had been, they made wide and fertile grazing - grounds for their cattle. Being so