when the sea was angry--and very prone he was to anger by that lonely
shore, and very quick to wrath; often have I known him sink to sleep with
a peaceful smile on his rippling waves, to wake in fierce fury before the
night was spent--he would snatch up giant handfuls of these pebbles and
fling and toss them here and there, till the noise of their rolling and
crashing could be heard by the watchers in the village afar off.

"Old Nick's playing at marbles to-night," they would say to one another,
pausing to listen. And then the women would close tight their doors, and
try not to hear the sound.

Far out to sea, by where the muddy mouth of the river yawned wide, there
rose ever a thin white line of surf, and underneath those crested waves
there dwelt a very fearsome thing, called the Bar. I grew to hate and be
afraid of this mysterious Bar, for I heard it spoken of always with bated
breath, and I knew that it was very cruel to fisher folk, and hurt them
so sometimes that they would cry whole days and nights together with the
pain, or would sit with white scared faces, rocking themselves to and
fro.

Once when I was playing among the sandhills, there came by a tall, grey
woman, bending beneath a load of driftwood. She paused when nearly
opposite to me, and, facing seaward, fixed her eyes upon the breaking
surf above the Bar. "Ah, how I hate the sight of your white teeth!" she
muttered; then turned and passed on.

Another morning, walking through the village, I heard a low wailing come
from one of the cottages, while a little farther on a group of women were
gathered in the roadway, talking. "Ay," said one of them, "I thought the
Bar was looking hungry last night."

So, putting one and the other together, I concluded that the "Bar" must
be an ogre, such as a body reads of in books, who lived in a coral castle
deep below the river's mouth, and fed upon the fishermen as he caught
them going down to the sea or coming home.

From my bedroom window, on moonlight nights, I could watch the silvery
foam, marking the spot beneath where he lay hid; and I would stand on tip-
toe, peering out, until at length I would come to fancy I could see his
hideous form floating below the waters. Then, as the little white-sailed
boats stole by him, tremblingly, I used to tremble too, lest he should
suddenly open his grim jaws and gulp them down; and when they had all
safely reached the dark, soft sea beyond, I would steal back to the