of the
Corbiere and the impaling rocks of Portelet Bay and Noirmont; the
hind-claws are the devastating diorite reefs of La Motte and the Banc
des Violets. The head and neck, terrible and beautiful, are stretched
out towards the west, as it were to scan the wild waste and jungle of
the Atlantic seas. The nose is L'Etacq, the forehead Grosnez, the ear
Plemont, the mouth the dark cavern by L'Etacq, and the teeth are the
serried ledges of the Foret de la Brequette. At a discreet distance from
the head and the tail hover the jackals of La Manche: the Paternosters,
the Dirouilles, and the Ecrehos, themselves destroying where they may,
or filching the remains of the tiger's feast of shipwreck and ruin.
In truth, the sleek beast, with its feet planted in fearsome rocks and
tides, and its ravening head set to defy the onslaught of the main,
might, but for its ensnaring beauty, seem some monstrous foot-pad of the
deep.

To this day the tiger's head is the lonely part of Jersey; a hundred
years ago it was as distant from the Vier Marchi as is Penzance from
Covent Garden. It would almost seem as if the people of Jersey, like the
hangers-on of the king of the jungle, care not to approach too near the
devourer's head. Even now there is but a dwelling here and there upon
the lofty plateau, and none at all near the dark and menacing
headland. But as if the ancient Royal Court was determined to prove its
sovereignty even over the tiger's head, it stretched out its arms from
the Vier Marchi to the bare neck of the beast, putting upon it a belt of
defensive war; at the nape, a martello tower and barracks; underneath,
two other martello towers like the teeth of a buckle.

The rest of the island was bristling with armament. Tall platforms were
erected at almost speaking distance from each other, where sentinels
kept watch for French frigates or privateers. Redoubts and towers were
within musket-shot of each other, with watch-houses between, and at
intervals every able-bodied man in the country was obliged to leave his
trade to act as sentinel, or go into camp or barracks with the militia
for months at a time. British cruisers sailed the Channel: now a
squadron under Barrington, again under Bridport, hovered upon the coast,
hoping that a French fleet might venture near.

But little of this was to be seen in the western limits of the parish
of St. Ouen's. Plemont, Grosnez, L'Etacq, all that giant headland could
well take care of itself--