mine. And straight they
have been ever since.

VISITORS AT THE GUNNEL ROCK.

A LIGHTSHIP IDYLL.

When first the Trinity Brothers put a light out yonder by the Gunnel
Rocks, it was just a trifling makeshift affair for the time--none of
your proper lightships with a crew of twelve or fourteen hands; and
my father and I used to tend it, taking turn and turn with two other
fellows from the Islands. I'm talking of old days. The rule then--
they have altered it since--was two months afloat and two ashore; and
all the time we tossed out there on duty, not a soul would we see to
speak to except when the Trinity boat put off with stores for us and
news of what was doing in the world. This would be about once a
fortnight in fair weather; but through the winter time it was oftener
a month, and provisions ran low enough, now and then, to make us
anxious. "Was the life dreary?" Well, you couldn't call it gay;
but, you see, it didn't kill me.

For the first week I thought the motion would drive me crazy--up and
down, up and down, in that everlasting ground-swell--although I had
been at the fishing all my life, and knew what it meant to lie-to in
any ordinary sea. But after ten days or so I got not to mind it.
And then there was the open air. It was different with the poor
fellows on the Lighthouse, eighteen miles to seaward of us, to the
south-west. They drew better pay than ours, by a trifle; but they
were landsmen, to start with; and cooped in that narrow tower at
night, with the shutters closed and the whole building rocking
like a tree, it's no wonder their nerves wore out. Four or five days
of it have been known to finish a man; and in those times a
lighthouse-keeper had three months of duty straight away, and only a
fortnight on shore. Now he gets only a fortnight out there, and six
weeks to recover in. With all that, they're mostly fit to start at
their own shadow when the boat takes them off.

But on the lightship we fared tolerably. To begin with, we had the
lantern to attend to. You'd be surprised how much employment that
gives a man--cleaning, polishing, and trimming. And my father,
though particular to a scratch on the reflector, or the smallest
crust of salt on the glass, was a restful, cheerful sort of a man to
bide with. Not talkative, you understand--no light-keeper in the
world was ever talkative--but with a power of silence that was more
comforting than speech. And out there, too, we f