LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume IV, Issue 438, 8 November 1875, Page 3

LITERATURE.

DEED FOE DEED,

(From London Society.) ‘ The Anchor Inn, Malt Eegis, ‘ Taxminster, Devon, ‘ August 23rd, 1873. ‘Eain, rain, nothing but rain and wind, my dear Celia; and this is the fourth day since the wreck, which happened, as I told you in my last, the very evening we arrived. George is becoming desperate. He declares he would return to London to-night if there were any sort of conveyance at hand by which he could, in such weather, get to the station. I don’t know how to pacify him. He is pacing the room like a wild animal, alternately flattening his nose against the little bow window of our sitting-room, flinging himself on to the hard horsehair sofa in despair, smoking innumerable pipes, and uttering strong language. * Of course I refrain froxu twitting him with the absurdity of this idea of his spending his holiday in a rural fishing village, fourteen miles from any railway, instead of going, like a rational creature, to a pleasant, cheerful, watering-place, where there would be something to see and people to talk to. It would be mean of me to take advantage of the opportunity the bad weather gives me of laying any stress now upon the folly of his proceeding; it must be sufficiently plain to him without any words of mine. So, like an affectionate wife, I hold my tongue. He wanted quiet, and he has it. ‘ By a stroke of good fortune, I have hit upon an occupation for him since writing the above, and he is now happy and amused.

‘ ‘ Why don’t you read one of these novels ?’ said I. ‘ There’s a large choice in. this box we brought from Mudie’s. 5 ‘ Pooh !’ he replied. ‘ I hate novels ! Parcel of bosh; the invention of a lot of fictitious people and events, which one is asked to interest oneself in as if they were real! I’d as lieve try to write a story as read one. In fact, I’d a deuced deal rather, if I could.’

‘ Why don’t you try ?’ ‘ Because I’ve no fancy, or imagination, or invention. I never know what to say, even in a letter (except upon business), now that I’ve done writing love-nonsense to you.” * ‘ Well, but you need not invent, A plain statement of facts, sometimes, is a story in itself, and allow me, sir, to say that there are quite as many romantic facts, if one has but the wit to set them down, going on constantly all around us as are to be found in the wildest scribblings of the novelist. Record, for instance, what you saw during the first twenty-four hours of our arrival here, and you have, at any rate, the opening of a good story. ’ * ‘ Done with you, then ! Upon my life, it was the most stirring scene I ever assisted at! I really will try and perpetuate it with the pen. ” And down he sat at the table. ‘ ‘ Good boy !’ said. I. ‘ Mind, no exaggeration ; simply what came under your own eye.’ ‘ Briefly, this is the sort of conversation, much abridged, which resulted in George’s writing the inclosed. Take it as the postscript to my letter; and certainly in this case it will > prove the truth of the adage, which says that in that afterthought lies the pith of a woman’s correspondence. Let me hear soon what you think of it, and all news, and

‘ Believe, me, * Your affectionate friend, L * Postscript. ‘No sooner had, we been welcomed by the landlord of the one decent inn at Malt Regis, where I had secured rooms, than he urged me to ascend the steep path at the rear of the house to the top of the cliffs, where, some way along, a curious cleft in their edge formed a sort of natural lookout. Hastily telling me that a brig had, within the last two hours, gone ashore, and that he was anxious to know how it fared with her and the crew, he said, ‘Yonder, at Monkey’s Grip, we can see what’s going on. Come with me, sir, and I’ll show you the way.’ ‘ I followed of course, only too glad that, since a wreck had happened, I at any rate was in time to witness it. A quarter of an hour of steep climbing up the western side of the valley in which the village lay brought us to the spot indicated. ‘ A wild scene of boiling breakers lies before us. The white spray, as it is hurled high into the air at every moment from off an ugly reef of rock, mingles with the leaden grey of the tearing storm clouds, which, in conjunction with the fierce wind, produces, until the eye becomes accustomed to it, the effect of a veil or gauze curtain, such as, on on the stage, is often lowered when supernatural or mysterious appearances are represented. Then, after long staring, the' dazed sight descries some details. An iron-bound coast—iron in colour, savage in form—grim and menacing cliffs and jutting headlands right and left—the first impression one of exceeding dreariness, if not of terror, hardly attractive to confirmed Londoner, seeking a pleasant seaside retreat. ‘ The hour is that of sunset, as is indicated by a lurid tone which, penetrating the leaden pall of the sky, gives additional weirdness to the outlook. But, viewed from the cliffs on which I stand, the sentiment of terror referred to is derived from the human element in the scene. ‘ A little crowd of men and women—the whole population of the village, I imagine—is gathered on the shore below. Great excitement prevails amongst them as they eagerly regard what has hitherto escaped my notice. At the end of the spit or reef of rocks I can at length distinguish, by steady watching, part of a mast and cross-trees, and, lashed or clinging to it, a human figure. ‘ Scarcely another remnant of the wreck is visible, only here and there patches of it drifting to leeward. The mast, however, is jammed under a sort of pinnacle of rock, of which there are several similar ones at intervals of a few yards all along the reef, and which, jutting high above the rough plain from which they rise, have the appearance of a jagged row of monstrous teeth. In all, the distance from the land to the outermost point is under two hundred yards; but the excessive ruggedness of the reef, and the swirling of the waves as they break and crash across it, preclude the idea of any passage along the irregular surface being possible for the lonely creature upon the mast.

‘ He is clear above the sea, and only now and then, when an access of water drives over the rocks, is he completely cut off from the mainland. Yet, exhausted as he probably is, although he ever and anon waves his arm encouragingly, he dares not, evidently, relinquish his position and trust to the perilous foothold by which alone he might, with good luck, be able to reach the land. My guide, the landlord, explains this situation to me, otherwise I might not clearly take it in, new as I am to such experiences; but now I do thoroughly, and,. therefore when I see a sturdy fisher-fellow, without his hat and clad only in his tight-fitting blue jersey and trousers, emerging from the crowd and begin to scramble forward over the neareet masses of rook, and when I see that a rope is attached to his waist, I know that it is his intention to try and rescue the man on the mast. {To be continued.')