ce that it trembled distinctly. Forsyth started up, for he
had never felt this before, and fancied the structure was about to
fall. For a moment or two he remained paralysed, for he heard the
most terrible and inexplicable sounds going on overhead. In fact, the
wave that shook the building had sent a huge volume of spray right
over the top, part of which fell into the lighthouse, and what poor
Forsyth heard was about a ton of water coming down through story
after story, carrying lime, mortar, buckets, trowels, and a host of
other things, violently along with it.

To plunge down the spiral stair, almost headforemost, was the work of
a few seconds. Forsyth accompanied the descent with a yell of terror,
which reached the ears of his comrades in the beacon, and brought
them to the door, just in time to see their comrade's long legs carry
him across the bridge in two bounds. Almost at the same instant the
water and rubbish burst out of the doorway of the lighthouse, and
flooded the bridge.

But let us return from this digression, or rather, this series of
digressions, to the point where we branched off: the aspect of the
beacon in the fog, and the calm of that still morning in June.

Some of the men inside were playing draughts, others were finishing
their breakfast; one was playing "Auld Lang Syne", with many
extempore flourishes and trills, on a flute, which was very much out
of tune. A few were smoking, of course (where exists the band of
Britons who can get on without that?), and several were sitting
astride on the cross-beams below, bobbing--not exactly for whales,
but for any monster of the deep that chose to turn up.

The men fishing, and the beacon itself, loomed large and mysterious
in the half-luminous fog. Perhaps this was the reason that the
sea-gulls flew so near them, and gave forth an occasional and very
melancholy cry, as if of complaint at the changed appearance of
things.

"There's naethin' to be got the day," said John Watt, rather
peevishly, as he pulled up his line and found the bait gone.

Baits are _always_ found gone when lines are pulled up! This would
seem to be an angling law of nature. At all events, it would seem to
have been a very aggravating law of nature on the present occasion,
for John Watt frowned and growled to himself as he put on another
bait.

"There's a bite!" exclaimed Joe Dumsby, with a look of doubt, at the
same time feeling his line.

"Poo'd in then," said Watt ironical