in the daylight, and to strike across country when dusk came on. The wind
had blown fresh all the morning from south-west, and after Elzevir had
left, strengthened to a gale. My leg was now so strong that I could walk
across the cave with the help of a stout blackthorn that Elzevir had cut
me: and so I went out that afternoon on to the ledge to watch the growing
sea. There I sat down, with my back against a protecting rock, in such a
place that I could see up-Channel and yet shelter from the rushing wind.
The sky was overcast, and the long wall of rock showed grey with
orange-brown patches and a darker line of sea-weed at the base like the
under strake of a boat's belly, for the tide was but beginning to make.
There was a mist, half-fog, half-spray, scudding before the wind, and
through it I could see the white-backed rollers lifting over Peveril
Point; while all along the cliff-face the sea-birds thronged the ledges,
and sat huddled in snowy lines, knowing the mischief that was brewing in
the elements.

It was a melancholy scene, and bred melancholy in my heart; and about
sun-down the wind southed a point or two, setting the sea more against
the cliff, so that the spray began to fly even over my ledge and drove me
back into the cave. The night came on much sooner than usual, and before
long I was lying on my straw bed in perfect darkness. The wind had gone
still more to south, and was screaming through the opening of the cave;
the caverns down below bellowed and rumbled; every now and then a giant
roller struck the rock such a blow as made the cave tremble, and then a
second later there would fall, splattering on the ledge outside, the
heavy spray that had been lifted by the impact.

I have said that I was melancholy; but worse followed, for I grew timid,
and fearful of the wild night, and the loneliness, and the darkness. And
all sorts of evil tales came to my mind, and I thought much of baleful
heathen gods that St. Aldhelm had banished to these underground cellars,
and of the Mandrive who leapt on people in the dark and strangled them.
And then fancy played another trick on me, and I seemed to see a man
lying on the cave-floor with a drawn white face upturned, and a red hole
in the forehead; and at last could bear the dark no longer, but got up
with my lame leg and groped round till I found a candle, for we had two
or three in store. 'Twas only with much ado I got it lit and set up in
the corner of the cave, and t