probability
mingled with all kinds of distorted fictions--the deeds of pirates
being supplemented to those of mere wreckers; the imaginations of
fishermen along the coast ever inventing plenteous horrors, and wild
tales of buccaneering rovers, originally written for other localities,
being now wilfully adopted and here located, until, at last, there was
hardly a known crime which could not find its origin or counterpart at
Beacon Ledge, and the whole neighboring shore became a melancholy
storehouse of terrors, disaster, and distress. These tales being
discovered to be very pleasing to most strangers, were carefully
cultivated and enlarged upon by each interested denizen of the place;
and to me, also, for awhile, they had a peculiar charm. I seldom
grew tired of hearing some grizzled, tar-incrusted fisherman reel
off his tissue of improbable abominations. For awhile, I say, since
there came, at last, a day when I cared no longer for such bloody
traditions, forgot the shadowy horrors that flitted about the spot,
and only thought and cared for it as the place where I had met and
loved dear little Jessie Barkstead.

She was the only child of the lighthouse keeper. In a worldly point of
view, therefore, was it wisely done that I should have set my
affections upon her? Possibly not; and it is likely that, had I known
the weakness of my mind, I would have shunned the danger from the very
first. But I was gay and reckless in my poor self-complacency and
deceitful assurance of inner strength; and long before I had fairly
realized how rapidly I was drifting, I found myself whirling down the
swift current, and was lost. Nor was it a marvel that this should have
so happened. To one who sits aloof in his unromantic, distant home, it
is an easy thing, indeed, to moralize about matters of inferior
station and _mesalliance_; but I believe that few could have seen
little Jessie, as she first appeared to me, and not have felt some
secret inclination to give way before those subtile charms of beauty
and manner which invested her. Moreover, let it here be mentioned
that she was not at all of humble birth or education. Old Barkstead
was himself a gentleman by culture and station, and had once been the
master of a gallant ship. In that important position he had been for
many years a pleasant and popular officer; but at length, in an evil
day, through some temporary weakness or neglect, he had lost his
charge, and almost ruined his employer