The railway to Sheerness has never opened up the island, and Sheppey, before the opening of the light railway that has recently been made to traverse its length, remained to Londoners an unknown land. It may be readily supposed that it will largely so remain, in spite of the facilities for travel that the new line provides, and notwithstanding the frantic efforts of the strenuous land companies, whose extravagant advertisements might lead the untravelled to suppose that here was the Garden of Eden, and that in purchasing building-sites in this remote corner of the kingdom speculators or prospective residents would be laying the foundations of rude health or comfortable fortunes. There are, it is true, few places so interesting as Sheppey, but why, apart from its history? Just because its scenery is so weird, its surroundings so outlandish. That scenery is of two sorts--the marshes that border the sea-channel of the Swale, dividing it from the Kentish mainland; and the high ridge or backbone which runs in the direction of the island's greatest length, from Sheerness to Warden Point and Shellness. Trees are few, and grow only in the more sheltered parts, if it can truly be said that there is shelter at all on Sheppey, where the winds--particularly the east winds--blow great guns, and boom, howl, and shriek in successful competition with the cannon of the heavy defences at Sheerness, whose deep, hoarse voices are puny compared with those of the gales that blow on Sheppey. All these historic and physical peculiarities of this right little, tight little island are very well for the explorer, who goes forth to discover the unusual--and certainly finds it here--and who would be grievously disappointed at not finding it, but to live on Sheppey would be another matter. Those marshlands whose delicate tints and general air so appeal to the casual stranger in summer, that muddy sea which sullenly washes away the crumbling, slimy cliffs of dark clay along the coast-line from Sheerness to Warden, lose their interest in the long months of winter, become merely grim and dismal, and obsess the mind with doleful imaginings.