continued: ‘Whether you believe what I’m going to say is no matter now.
_I_ believe it, though I can’t understand how it all came about. Well,
as I said before, the time was hard on twenty years ago, and the night
was the last in October.’
‘Bedad, and it’s that same night now!’ put in Murphy.
‘So it is!’ acquiesced Old Grizzly; ‘but I never thought of it
till this minute; and now the whole thing comes round again on
All-Halloween, of all nights in the year. Those of you boys who’ve
been raised in the old country will know what folks believe, in most
villages and country places, of Halloween, and the strange things that
happen then to men abroad at midnight, and to lads and lasses who try
the Halloween spells for wives and husbands.’
‘Sure everybody knows them things,’ agreed Murphy, casting an uneasy
glance over his shoulder as he spoke.
‘Well, true or false, I for one thought little enough of them when
I was young; but as luck or fate would have it, I rode through the
Devil’s Panniken on the 31st of October, that special night I’m going
to tell you of. I wasn’t alone either; perhaps, if I had been, I
shouldn’t have felt so jolly; for, not to speak of the loneliness
of the place, with its great black rocks towering up on either side
of you, and almost shutting out the sky, except for a narrow strip
overhead, the place had an ill name both with the Injuns and with
miners. Many a queer tale was told round camp-fires, and folks said the
place was haunted; that miners had lost their way there many a time,
and had never been seen or heard of again.
‘I’d been working all that season at a Claim—a new un then, but worked
out and forgotten now—which we used to call Cherokee Dick’s, because a
Cherokee Injun first showed us the place. There was perhaps a dozen of
us all told; but I chummed and worked from the first along with a chap
they called the “Flying Dutchman.” When we had been together a goodish
bit, he told me his real name was Cornelius Vermudyn; and I acquainted
him with mine and where I hailed from. He was a Dutchman, sure enough,
but had travelled half over the world, I used to think from his talk;
and he could speak as good English as you or me—or any here.’
A dubious smile hovered for an instant on Gentleman Jack’s lips at
this naïve statement, but nobody observed him; they were all intent on
Old Grizzly and his yarn, and that worthy continued: ‘We began to find
our Claim about cleaned out, and we—that’s me and Vermudyn—reckoned to
make tracks before the winter, and get down ’Frisco-way. Well, we each
had a good horse and a nice bit of gold, and we was sworn mates—come
what might—so we started, riding as far as we could by day and camping
out at night, if we weren’t able to reach a settlement or diggings by
nightfall.
‘On this night, it seemed as if we’d no luck from the beginning. We
lost our way for a goodish bit, and were some time finding the track
again; after that, night seemed to come on us suddenly like. We’d rode
and rode that day without ever a sign of man or beast, and when we
came to this place, Vermudyn says: “This must be the famous Devil’s
Panniken, old boy.” I had been almost falling asleep on my horse’s
neck; but I woke with a start, and answered all in a hurry: “Of course
it is.” It seemed somehow as if I knew that place well, and I began to
ride on quickly.
“Stop!” hollered Vermudyn, “unless you want to lame your horse or break
his knees among those rocks.” As he came up with me, he put his hand on
my arm, and I drew rein.
“Anyhow,” I said, “let’s get out of this, and then we’ll camp for the
night. I’m as tired as a dog, and can hardly stick in my saddle.”
“Why not camp here?” says Vermudyn with a laugh. “Who’s afraid?”
“I’m not—if that’s what you mean,” I answered; “but I’d rather camp
outside.”
“A good two miles of bad riding,” said he quietly. “Why shouldn’t we
content ourselves with a snug corner of the rocks, where we can shelter
from the wind? As far as I can make out, there’s brush and litter
enough for a fire, and we’ve got a bait for our horses.”
‘While he talked and argued, I grew more and more tired, exactly as if
I had ridden a hundred miles without drawing rein. It seemed then as if
I didn’t care what came next, so long as I could roll myself up in my
blanket and snooze, so I answered short enough: “Have your own way. The
place is ours, I reckon, as much as it is other folk’s.”
“The pixies and demons, you mean,” laughed Vermudyn. “I know all the
miners’ tales! Never fear. I dare wager we shall see nothing worse
than ourselves, if we stop for a month of Sundays.—Did you ever hear,”
he went on, “of the White Witch of the Panniken? She should meet us
hereabouts, if all tales be true. She waits for lonely travellers, and
shows them gold in the rock where gold never was in daylight; and if
a man is tempted, for the gold’s sake or hers, to spend the night with
her, he’s never seen or heard of in this world again. She feasts him
with the sight of big nuggets and her own beauty, while she sucks his
heart’s blood like the vampyre; and when his body is drained to the
last drop, he is flung aside among the rocks or dropped in some dark
gully; and she comes back to watch the road for a fresh prey.”
“I’ve heard of the White Witch many a time; but I never knew the rights
of the story until to-night,” said I. “But witch or no witch, we’ll
have to stop; the road grows harder, and my horse seems to stumble at
every step. It’s so dark, too, I can hardly see my hand before my face;
yet it seemed almost daylight when we rode into the gorge.”
“The pair of us will be too many for the White Witch, anyhow,” said
Vermudyn. “Too much human society don’t agree with her ghostly
constitution.”
‘We had stopped together, and I was just going to get off my horse,
when Vermudyn sang out in a hurry: “I see a light!—there to the left.
Let’s ride up. We may find a party forced to camp out like ourselves;
or they may be Injuns; and any company is better than none to-night.”
“Right enough,” says I, rubbing my eyes. “There is a light,
and a pretty strong one too; a steady light, mate, and not a
Will-o’-the-wisp. I never heard before of white man or Injun daring to
camp in the Devil’s Panniken.”
“Well, we must go up quietly till we can see our company,” said my
mate. “We don’t want to drop on a gang of freebooters, who’ll ease us
of the dust, and then leave us with a bullet through our heads, as a
parting gift.”
‘After this, we rode forward in silence for what seemed a quarter of
a mile; but we went at a foot’s pace, on account of picking our way
among the rocks that lay thick in the road. Then, as we turned a sharp
corner, we saw all at once that the light came not from a camp-fire,
but from a house!
“Well,” says I, “in all the years I’ve worked in these parts, man and
boy, and tramped from claim to claim, I’ve never heard that there was
hut or shanty in this place.”
“Nor I neither,” returns Vermudyn; “but perhaps it’s a new spec; though
what folks could want with a house where there’s neither gold to find
nor land to farm is more than I can tell. We may thank our luck we’ve
tumbled across it.”
‘He jumped off his horse as we drew rein at the door of the queerest
old house I ever saw. It was a tumble-down sort of a place, half-stone,
half-wood; and the woodwork was fast going to decay, though we could
see plainly enough that time and money had once been spent over it.
The stone was pretty rough; but the house was all pointed gable-ends
and queer-shaped long windows. The high-peaked overhanging roof and
the diamond panes reminded me of houses I’d seen in England when I
was a young un. The pointed gables were faced with carved oak; and
heavy oaken beams, black with age, formed the framework of the upper
stories; while the spaces between were roughcast with shingle and
plaster. The wickedest old faces were grinning and leering at us from
the carvings above the windows; and we could see the whole place, every
stick and stone about it, as plain as daylight. We had been riding in
darkness through the Devil’s Panniken, a darkness that grew blacker as
we went on; and the light from this house fairly dazed us at first.
Every window flamed as though there were jolly fires in each room,
and hundreds of candles. The place seemed all aflame inside and out;
the walls were as bright as if the moon was shining her clearest and
strongest full on the house; yet,’ said Old Grizzly, dropping his voice
impressively, ‘there was no moon at all that night! We stopped and
looked at one another in wonder, and then stared at the house again.
We could hear sounds inside now quite plain, men’s voices, and women’s
too. Ugly sounds besides, that I couldn’t understand; such howling and
shrieking as though all Bedlam were let loose inside—wailing like some
creature in pain, and roars of mocking laughter. I turned deadly cold,
and shivered as if it were midwinter.
“For mercy’s sake, let’s get away from this madhouse—if it’s not
something worse!” said I. “All’s not right here; and I’d go afoot all
night before I’d rest in that place.”
“Nonsense!” returned Vermudyn in his impetuous way. “I’m going in,
anyhow; and you’ll stop to see fair-play, I know.”
‘The upshot of it was he seized my arm and led me into the house; while
a gipsy-looking fellow came out for our horses, after we’d unloaded
our knapsacks and blankets. My gold was sewed in a belt round my body,
and I determined to fight hard for dear life, if need be; whilst I was
equally determined to see Vermudyn through the night’s adventure, as
far as it lay in my power.
‘If the outside of the house was strange to us, the inside was still
stranger. The furniture appeared to be hundreds of years old. The
presses, chairs, and tables were all of polished black oak, which
reflected the light of many candles; while a big fire roared in the
open fireplace, near which a table was laid for supper, and everything
on it matched all we’d already seen. There were drinking-horns mounted
in silver; cups of the same; such a load of plate as I’d never seen
in my life, and such as, I was pretty certain, belonged to no country
inn in a wild district where the only travellers were miners, and the
only natives Injuns. On the top of a carved press in one corner there
was a fine show of bottles—long-necked, slender flasks, crusted over
with age and cobwebs; and short squat bottles, that held hollands and
Kirschwasser, Vermudyn told me.
‘Well, while we took stock of the room and its contents, there wasn’t
a soul to be seen, yet the noise and hubbub continued still all around
us; the clatter of a hundred voices rising and falling far and near
like the wind. Laughter, screams, and low moans all together, or
following each other quickly. The longer I listened, the less I liked
it; yet, as I sat in a corner of the big chimney, I seemed to grow
drowsy and stupid-like, as if I had no power of my limbs or my voice. I
think I couldn’t have walked a dozen steps for a thousand pounds; yet
I could still hear and see all, through a light mist that fell betwixt
me and everything I looked at.
‘Vermudyn didn’t appear afraid or surprised in the least; and the
spell—I can call it nothing else—that was over me had no effect on him.
He stood in front of the fire, warming his hands, and looking round him
quite gaily, and pleased with all he saw.
“Wake up, mate!” he called to me; “we’ve fallen in luck’s way this
time, surely. You’ve no cause to fear. It seems to me that I must
have been here a score of times before, I know the place so well; and
yet”—he stopped for a minute and put his hand over his eyes—“and yet—it
can’t be!—I know it. That press,” he went on, “should hold the green
suit.” And stepping across the room, he opened a worm-eaten cupboard in
the far corner, and took out a suit of faded green velvet, the cut of
which reminded me of old pictures I’d seen at home; and when Vermudyn
took them out and looked them over carefully, the whole thing struck me
so absurdly, that I began to laugh like a maniac, though still I had
no power to speak. I wanted to tell him he would look like a tumbling
mountebank at a fair, if he rigged himself out in the velvet suit; but
I only laughed and nodded at him silently from the chimney corner, like
some drivelling old dotard.
‘However, he didn’t put it on, but, as if struck suddenly by another
thought, threw it aside, and opened a cupboard near the fireplace. He
smiled again. “I knew it was here,” he said softly, as he returned
to the fire, and stooping down, held something to the light. It was
a little box of carved ivory, yellow with age, and strangely shaped;
but Vermudyn seemed as familiar with it as he was with the rest of the
wonders in that house, for he pressed a spring, and the lid flew up,
disclosing a sparkling chain made like a snake, with shining scales of
beaten gold that glittered in the flickering firelight.
‘While Vermudyn was still looking at its twisted coils and muttering to
himself, the door opened, and a troop of figures crowded into the room.’
IS THE SEASHORE FREE TO ALL?
To the ordinary visitor to the seacoast this question may seem
unnecessary. To him it probably appears, if he ever gives the matter
a thought, that the shore is free and open to everybody; and that no
one person really has any more rights over it than another. If he were
told that he was no more entitled to walk or be driven across the beach
for the purpose of obtaining his morning dip in the sea than he was to
cross the park of a private gentleman and bathe in his lake without
permission, he would probably refuse all credence to the statement.
If he were further told that when he picked up a shell off the sands
and walked away with it, he was guilty of an unlawful act, his mental
attitude would most likely be one of indignation, and in most cases his
belief in his own indisputable right to be where he was, and to enjoy
himself as seemed best to him, provided that he did not interfere with
the comfort of his neighbours, would be in no way shaken.
It is the object of what follows to show how little ground there is
for this belief. To begin with, a brief definition of the shore will
be useful. Strictly speaking, it is that portion of the land adjacent
to the sea which is alternately covered and uncovered by the ordinary
flow and ebb of the tides. The fringe of rock, sand, or shingle, which
is to be found on most parts of the English coast, and which is never
under water except at the highest spring-tides, does not form a part
of the ‘shore,’ though it is commonly spoken of as such; and the law
only recognises as shore that portion of the coast which lies between
the ordinary high and low water marks. All that portion of it which
lies nearer to the land than the ordinary high-water mark is part of
the _terra firma_, and, as such, is subject to the usual rights of
ownership. This technical ‘shore’ throughout the coasts of England
belongs, except as is mentioned afterwards, to the Crown. As is well
known, the theory of the law is that the whole soil of England belonged
originally to the sovereign, by whom it has, in process of time, been
almost entirely granted to subjects. Some of our sovereigns have also
occasionally exercised their rights of ownership in the seashore by
making grants of it, in company with the adjoining _terra firma_; so
that there are cases in which the shore, as well as the adjacent _terra
firma_, is subject to private ownership.
So much by way of definition and explanation. Let us now briefly
consider what rights the ordinary subject has to the use and enjoyment
of the seashore. We will begin by considering his right to use it as a
means of access to the sea for the purpose of bathing. The first time
this question was raised in a court of justice in England was in the
case of Blundell against Caterall, which was tried in the year 1821. If
the reader will look at a map of England, he will find marked on the
coast of Lancashire, a few miles north of Liverpool, the town of Great
Crosby. In the year 1815 an hotel was built there. Before that time,
people who lived at Great Crosby had bathed on the beach, but they had
done so in a simple and primitive manner; they undressed themselves
in some convenient spot, and then walked over the sands into the sea.
When the hotel was built, the proprietor thought that it would be for
the comfort of his guests and his own profit if a more convenient means
of bathing were provided; and so he had built a number of ‘machines’
of the well-known type. Caterall was one of the hotel proprietor’s
servants, and was employed by him to drive these machines into the sea.
The plaintiff, Mr Blundell, was lord of the manor of Great Crosby, and
he claimed that the shore there had been specially granted to him, and
formed part of his manor. This grant of the shore was not proved, but
it was not questioned by the counsel who appeared for Caterall, and
so was taken for granted. The contention of Caterall’s counsel was
what would probably be in accordance with the views of most people on
the subject. He argued that there was a common-law right for all the
king’s subjects to bathe on the seashore, and to pass over it for that
purpose on foot or with horses and carriages.
The case was fully discussed and long judgments were delivered by
the four judges before whom it was tried. The result was that it was
decided by three judges against one that no such general right in the
subject to frequent the shore for the purpose of bathing existed,
whether on foot or in carriages. The dissenting judge, who seems to
have taken a broad and common-sense view of the matter, based his
judgment on the general grounds of the sea being the great highway
of the world; of the importance of a free access to it; and of the
necessity of a right to bathe in it, as essential to the health of so
many persons. ‘It was clear,’ he said, ‘that persons had bathed in
the sea from the earliest times, and that they had been accustomed to
walk or ride on the sands.... The shore of the sea is admitted to have
been at one time the property of the king, and from the general nature
of the property, it could never be used for exclusive occupation.
It was holden by the king, like the sea and highways, for all his
subjects.’ Unfortunately for the subjects, however, the other three
judges, and consequently the majority of the court, were convinced by
the arguments of the counsel who opposed the claim to the right of
bathing. This opposition was based on three grounds. ‘First,’ said
Mr Blundell’s counsel, ‘there is no evidence to be found in any of
the legal authorities for the existence of any such right; they are
completely silent upon the matter. Secondly, such a right is contrary
to analogies. Thirdly, such a right is contrary to acknowledged and
established rights.’
The first and third of these arguments seem to have chiefly influenced
the judges in coming to their decision. This decision, which must
be taken as ruling the matter, up to the present time at anyrate,
declares, as has been stated, that the subject has no right to pass
over the shore for the purpose of bathing. The actual right to bathe in
the sea does not seem to have been disputed; what was settled was, that
a man has no right to pass over the shore in order to reach the sea.
If any one chooses to take ship from Ireland to within a few yards of
the Lancashire coast, and then bathe from the deck, there is nothing in
the decision in the case of Blundell against Caterall to show that he
would in any way be going beyond his strict legal rights. Such a course
would, however, be inconvenient—and decidedly expensive.
Of course, when the shore remains undisputedly in the possession of the
Crown, no interference with the subject’s privilege of bathing, under
fitting conditions, is to be apprehended. The decision in Blundell _v._
Caterall, however, shows that where a portion of the shore has been
made the subject of a grant, there is nothing to hinder the person in
whose favour the grant has been made from entirely preventing it from
being used for the purpose of bathing, or from allowing it to be so
used only on payment of any tax he may choose to demand. It is scarcely
necessary to say that no such claim on the part of a private subject
to such property in the shore, carrying with it, as it does, the right
to tax, or even prevent altogether, sea-bathing, should be allowed
without the strictest possible examination of it. Whether a man is
possessed of the shore will entirely depend upon the exact words used
to describe the boundaries of the land granted to him. If the deed of
grant describes the land to be granted ‘down to the sea,’ or if any
similar words be used, such grant would not include the shore; for it,
as we have said, is what lies between high-water and low-water marks;
and ‘down to the sea’ would be taken to mean down to the ordinary
high-water mark, and so would just fall short of the ‘shore.’ If, on
the other hand, it should be distinctly stated that the land is granted
down to low-water mark, or to any definite distance out to sea, which
would include the low-water mark, then undoubtedly the shore, with its
attached rights, has been granted. Because it has been held judicially
that the subject has no right to use the shore as a means of access to
the sea for the purpose of bathing, it must not, however, be inferred
that he has no right to be there at all. From time immemorial it has
been recognised that the ownership by the Crown of the sea-shore is
limited by a common-law right on the part of the subject to pass over
it to reach the sea, for the purposes of fishing and navigation; and
as the Crown cannot transfer to other persons more than it possesses
itself, these rights of the general public still exist when the shore
has passed into private hands.
The right of bathing is not the only right which most people are apt to
take for granted which has been disputed, and disputed successfully,
in the courts. How many people know that when they pick up a shell
or a piece of seaweed and take it home with them, they are rendering
themselves liable to an action? Yet it is so, as what follows will
show. In the year 1801, one Bagott was the owner of a certain manor in
the parish of Keysham, and this manor included—or at anyrate, Bagott
claimed that it did, and his claim was not disputed—a portion of the
seashore. In cases such as those here cited, there seems to have been
far too great readiness to admit claims to the shore. It appears that
on this part of the coast shellfish were found in great numbers, and
it was the custom of the people in the neighbourhood to take them for
the purpose of selling them, or using them as food. Amongst those who
did so was a man called Orr. He employed other men to help him, and
took away great quantities of the shellfish in carts, and seems, by
the magnitude of his operations, to have exhausted Bagott’s patience.
At anyrate, Bagott commenced an action against him, alleging that he
(Orr) had entered certain closes of his (Bagott’s) ‘lying between the
flux and reflux of the tides of the sea, in the plaintiff’s manor of
Keysham, and the said shellfish and fish-shells there found, caught,
took, and carried away, and converted, and disposed thereof, when the
said closes were left dry and were not covered with water.’ To this Orr
urged in defence, that what the plaintiff called his closes were, as a
matter of fact, rocks and sand of the sea, lying within the flux and
reflux of the tides of the sea, and that the shellfish and fish-shells
which he had taken away were ‘certain shellfish and fish-shells which
were in and upon the said rocks and sands of the sea, and which were,
by the ebbing of the tides of the sea, left there in and upon the said
closes; and that every subject of this realm of right had the liberty
and privilege of getting, taking, and carrying away the shellfish and
fish-shells left by the said ebbing of the sea.’ The judgment of the
court, as it appears in the Report of the trial, gives none of the
reasons upon which it was founded, but merely declares in the baldest
manner possible that the defendant had a right to take the _shellfish_;
but that, as no authority had been brought forward to support his claim
to take _shells_, the court would pause before establishing a general
right of that kind!