sound rapidly enough as we draw near it."

When in a short time the corvette was off the Bard or Beard of Brassay,
as the ragged-looking southern end of that island is called, a turn of
the helm to starboard sent the vessel into the Sound, and up she flew
with smooth green heights on either side, here and there a few white
buildings showing, and numerous rocks visible, till the pilot warned the
captain that it was time to shorten sail. At a word the sailors were
seen swarming aloft; studding-sails came in as if by magic, royals and
top-gallant sails were handed, topsails clewed up, and with her taunt
tapering masts and square yards alone, surrounded by the intricate
tracery of their rigging, the beautiful fabric glided up to an anchorage
off the town of Lerwick.

"Friend, you brought the ship to an anchor in true seamanlike style,"
said Captain Don Hernan, touching the young pilot on the shoulder. "You
have not been a simple pilot all your life."

"No, indeed, captain," answered the pilot, "I have been afloat since my
earliest days in southern seas, as well as engaged in the Greenland
fishery. Lately I have been mate of a whaler, and maybe my next voyage
I shall have charge of a ship as master. You have hit the right nail on
the head--this is the first summer that I ever spent on shore."

"Can I trust you, then, to take charge of the ship round the coast?"
asked the captain. "Perhaps, however, you are not well acquainted with
that?"

The pilot smiled. "There is not a point or headland, a rock, or shoal,
or island, which I have not as clearly mapped down in my memory, as are
the hues on yonder chart, and more correctly, too, I doubt not."

"That will do--I will trust you," said Don Hernan. "What is your name,
friend, that I may send for you when you are wanted?"

"Rolf Morton," was the answer; "but my home is some way to the
northward, on the island of Whalsey. There you have it on your chart.
Those who live on it boast that it is the finest of the outlying
islands; and well I know that such a castle as we have is not to be
found in all Shetland."

"Ah, it is your native place," observed the captain. "You therefore
think so highly of it."

"Not exactly, though I remember no other spot of earth before I put eyes
on Whalsey. I was, so I have been told, picked up, when a child, from a
wreck at sea; and the men I was with called me Rolf Morton, the name
which has stuck to me for want of a better. I know