f his birthplace, can see the memorial of their hero's fame,
and the country lads of to-day are constantly reminded of the success
which attended the industry and perseverance of a humble Marton boy.

The cottage where James Cook was born in 1728 has gone, but the field in
which it stood is called Cook's Garth. The shop at Staithes, generally
spoken of as a 'huckster's,' where Cook was apprenticed as a boy, has
also disappeared; but, unfortunately, that unpleasant story of his
having taken a shilling from his master's till, when the attractions of
the sea proved too much for him to resist, persistently clings to all
accounts of his early life. There seems no evidence to convict him of
this theft, but there are equally no facts by which to clear him. But if
we put into the balance his subsequent term of employment at Whitby, the
excellent character he gained when he went to sea, and Professor J.K.
Laughton's statement that he left Staithes 'after some disagreement with
his master,' there seems every reason to believe that the story is
untrue. If it were otherwise, the towering monument on Easby Moor would
be a questionable inspiration to posterity.

I have seldom seen a more uninhabited and inhospitable-looking country
than the broad extent of purple hills that stretch away to the
south-west from Great Ayton and Kildale Moors. Walking from Guisborough
to Kildale on a wild and stormy afternoon in October, I was totally
alone for the whole distance when I had left behind me the baker's boy
who was on his way to Hutton with a heavy basket of bread and cakes.
Hutton, which is somewhat of a model village for the retainers attached
to Hutton Hall, stands in a lovely hollow at the edge of the moors. The
steep hills are richly clothed with sombre woods, and the peace and
seclusion reigning there is in marked contrast to the bleak wastes
above. When I climbed the steep road on that autumn afternoon, and,
passing the zone of tall, withered bracken, reached the open moorland, I
seemed to have come out merely to be the plaything of the elements; for
the south-westerly gale, when it chose to do so, blew so fiercely that
it was difficult to make any progress at all. Overhead was a dark roof
composed of heavy masses of cloud, forming long parallel lines of gray
right to the horizon. On each side of the rough, water-worn road the
heather made a low wall, two or three feet high, and stretched right
away to the horizon in every direction.