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The sun was nearing the horizon. The scene was one of unsurpassed loveliness. Behind lay the central and southern portions of the island, hushed as if their primaeval rocks were still tenantless. The outlines of the isles of Herm and Jethou were visible, but already sinking into the shades of evening.
He told Carette of England and London at times, and drew so wildly on his imagination yet came so very far from the reality that Carette flatly denied the possibilities of such things, and looked upon him as a romancer of parts, though she put it more briefly. She herself lay facing west, gazing longingly at Herm and Jethou, with the long line of Guernsey behind. Guernsey bounded her aspirations.
In Alderney it is quite as common as in Guernsey, and I saw two nests this year amongst the long grass growing on the earthworks near the Artillery Barracks; it is equally common also both in Jethou, Sark, and Herm.
Right manfully I took up my task, and in a moment the dark sail ran up the mast, Simon undid the fastening and pushed off, and with Jacques cunningly guiding us from the rocks, the boat stole noiselessly from the bay, coasting northward for a space to get away from the Moorish ships that still lay outside, and then, aided by a dim white mist that lay upon the face of the waters and a chill night-breeze, we bore away to the south of Herm and Jethou, whose craggy sides loomed black and terrible as we sailed by.
My boat swirled into the narrow way between Herm and Jethou, where the water came up lunging and thrusting like great black jelly-fish. I dropped my sail and took the oars, and stood with my face to the bows and pulled cautiously among the traps and snares that lay thick on every side and still more dangerously out of sight.
On and on Jethou was gone, and bit by bit the long green and gold slopes of Herm were conquered, and its long white spear of sand ran out of the low white cloud. And still on, till all the outlying rocks and islands vanished, and where had been the glow and colour of life was nothing now but that strange pall-like cloud.
So we sat on the short salt turf and waited. "Tiens!" said Carette, pointing suddenly. And looking, we saw three boats pull out from the channel between Herm and Jethou.
It was a good half-hour before the cloud drew off and they saw Guernsey, Herm, and Jethou sparkling in the sun once more. Then they crossed the narrow path over the neck, and Margaret was glad they had not attempted it in the fog. They picked up Miss Penny, damp but cheerful, and went home.
But on the other hand I should think a good many of the young must be driven off to seek quarters elsewhere by their most pugnacious parents, for of all birds the Robin is by far the most pugnacious with which I am acquainted, and deserves the name of "pugnax" much more than the Ruff, and in a limited space like Jethou and Herm battles between the old and the young would be constant unless some of the young departed altogether from the Island.
One or two pairs, perhaps more, breed on the before-mentioned rock close to Jethou "La Fauconnière," though a few pairs of Kestrels breeding there would scarcely have been sufficient to give it its name. It is mentioned in Professor Ansted's list, but only marked as occurring in Guernsey and Sark. There are two specimens, a male and female, in the Museum. SPARROWHAWK. Accipiter nisus, Linnaeus.
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