Guernsey is an easy study; it may be _coasted_ and _threaded_, and its objects of natural and archæological interest analysed, in four or five days. In calm weather, however, the cliff beauty of the islet may be contemplated more perfectly from a boat, surveyed from Fermains Bay to Les Hanois. The coast from Port St. Pierre to St. Sampson is flat, and studded with rocklets, on which loads of _vraich_ and _laminaria_ and _asperococcus_ are profusely strewn. These algæ are gathered and dried for fuel, at the legal harvest time, in March and July, the harvest home being profusely supplied with _vraich cakes_ and bread. The digging and blasting of the quarries of black stone, and the tiny windmills that drain these excavations, give life to the scene as we approach St. Sampson’s. Martello towers crown several of the brows, and there is within very old walls to the left a little remnant now styled _Ivy Castle_. It is not worth the visit, although it is a bit of a castle, built by Robert of Normandy, contemporary with that of Jerbourg. We are close to the archæological gems of the islet,—the churches of _St. Sampson_ and _Braye la Ville_, or _du Val_, within a mile of each other, at each end of a flat alluvial isthmus. The first is dated 1111, its name being derived from Sampson, Bishop of St. David’s, consecrated Bishop of Dol under the Duke of Brittany, and endowed with these islets by Childebert of France. He came to Guernsey, and built a chapel here. There are three aisles, with massive pillars and Norman arches; the old gallery-loft and the tower are in exquisite antique. It is profusely covered by most luxuriant ivy with enormous stems. The steeple of Braye du Val, dated 1117, is very eccentric, immense granitic blocks lying before the belfry-door. At low water we cross the harbour of St. Sampson’s, Vale, or Du Val, on stepping-stones. The Castle on the mound was erected as a defence against the incursion of the Danes, and then called St. Michael’s, or the Castle of the Archangel. There is a legend imputing its erection chiefly to a band of military monks, who, in a sort of holy pilgrimage, made a descent on the islet. A Druidical _carn_ lies on the hill, half a mile northward on the left of the road. There are twelve upright and three immense horizontal stones. The largest of these, fifteen feet long and a yard thick, rests on four uprights, the second only on two, the third on the second and the edge of the pit, so that six uprights are unoccupied. From this brow there is a perspective view of the chief objects in the islet, Alderney lying on the horizon to the north-east. Forts _Doyle_ and _Pembroke_ are on the northern point on either side of _Lancresse Bay_, the bay of “_Anchorage_,” in which the Duke of Normandy landed in a storm, as he was sailing over to England to Edward the Confessor.