There is a halo of interest around these men, tame as their work may appear to them at times. Take the watchers on the Scilly Isles, for instance. They are as good as any around Great Britain. It is second nature for them to watch the sea. It is a desire with them, something they would not miss. Their fathers, grandfathers, and great-grandfathers were watch-dogs on that area of the ocean. Go to St. Mary's, and you will see a coast-watcher, up soon after dawn, take a stroll along the beach, even when he is not supposed to be on duty and before he has tasted his morning tea. The family telescope is at his eye, as he wants to get a good look at what the sea has been doing, and what is there. To the uninitiated, it seems to have the same paucity of interest as any other shipless stretch of water; but to this expert it has a story. He notes the clouds, the sun, the very rocks; and they say that his gaze is so sharp that it would spot a champagne-cork floating some distance away. But be that as it may, there is no enemy periscope that is going to pass unobserved at a certain distance by this hawk-eyed, wind-seared man. He goes to his cottage for breakfast, and talks about the sea, then leaves the table, and has another good look; and it is sadly disappointing to any of these men to have missed a passing ship. Prior to the declaration of hostilities, a wreck was the greatest piece of news to the community; but now it is the glimpse of fast English warships, and the anticipation of sighting a German U-boat, and thus being the cause of the craft's doom. "Gun-firing heard at ten minutes past twelve o'clock to-day," said one man, reading from a slip he had just made out on the subject. The man to whom he spoke happened to have been out of hearing distance, and he could not believe it until a second man came along with the same report. It was handed down the line, over to other shores, and the watchers speculated as to what had taken place. Arthur Oddy, who has charge of half a dozen watchers, told me that his one great regret was that he had not seen a sign of the war, barring uniforms. Nevertheless, for more than two and a half years he has scanned the sea and shore of his district with dutiful care, and has seen to it that his men have not been amiss in their share of the tedious task. His station is very near the Last House in England, at Land's End--a tea place kept by Mrs. E. James. "What is that out there?" exclaimed a stranger, suddenly. "Looks like part of a boat." "That," declared Oddy, "is the Shark's Fin--a rock." True enough, the rock of that name might have at times been a giant fish or a wrecked submarine. It was lashed by the foamy waters, disappeared, and then showed a bit, again was swallowed up, and seemed to reappear a yard or so further along from where it first was seen. Finally, you observed that it was a sharp, dangerous rock.