Such is an example of his methods, and, if any pious reactionaries object, I can only say that in the result it was educational; that it won tavern-loafers to at least one wholesome evening in the week; that, in short, it attained such popularity, that any dissipated seceder attempting to sneak out of the church, and thereby obscure the light by so much as the loss of a taper, would be roughly grabbed back by his fellows, and forced, willy-nilly, to hear the lecture out. Mr. Sant, to sum him up, was a zealot without being a bigot, and a devoted servant to his Master without prejudice to human nature. He was also a capable boxer. I came to love as much as to respect him. CHAPTER VIII. TREASURE-HUNTING. For a fortnight succeeding our arrival the weather remained calm and bright, so that Uncle Jenico and I were able to explore the locality with great comfort and satisfaction. The coast, which we followed up both north and south for miles, was extremely desolate and unvisited, though bearing at intervals all along it the traces of former settlements. It would seem to have been quite thickly populated once, during a period which dated probably from the incursions, first, of the Roman legions, and, after, of those salt sea-wolves who preferred squatting round the fringes of their conquered island--with the open door of the sea beside them, and its smell in their briny nostrils--to penetrating into the traps of the close-shut valleys. Later, Christianity had come to fret these windy, foam-whipped settlements with pinnacles, and monastic walls, and stone fanes with jewelled windows and airy bell-towers, so that church might peal to church all down this long front line of the position it had won. But corruption creeping in with prosperity, and lawlessness with the tides, God had withdrawn His countenance from the temples that abused His service, and had permitted the ocean to break in their defences and one by one devour them. The priest who had evaded his vows had ages ago tucked up his cassock and fled; the parson who succeeded him, and to the reversion of his benefices, could not so hoodwink Heaven by taking his tithes of smuggled tobacco and brandy, as to stay for one season the hunger of the gluttonous waters. Year by year, century by century, the storms had fed on these devoted sand-built coasts, and were still feeding when we came to know them. Towns and once-flourishing colonies had disappeared as utterly as if they had never existed. Not only they, but the very soil on which they had been planted, paved the floor of the ocean for miles out. There were legends of foundered bells rung by unseen mermen at incredible distances from shore. There were stories of treasure chests and sculptured marbles revealed to storm-belated fishermen in the deep troughs of monstrous, bottom-scouring waves. So far away as the Weary Sands themselves, it was said, traces of the ancient Dunberry could be spelt out, in calm