PREFACE._Legends of Fire Island Beach and the South Side

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[Illustration: "A BARRIER OF SAND STRETCHING FOR TWENTY MILES ALONG

THE SOUTH COAST OF LONG ISLAND"]

LEGENDS OF FIRE

ISLAND BEACH and

the SOUTH SIDE

EDWARD RICHARD SHAW

NEW YORK

LOVELL, CORYELL & COMPANY

310-318 Sixth Avenue

United States Book Company

_TO MY FRIEND

WILLIAM S. PELLETREAU

OF SOUTHAMPTON, L. I._

PREFACE.

These stories embody only a small part of the folk-lore and tradition

that pertained to the Great South Bay. They were told by a class of men

now gone. Fact, imagination, and superstition--each contributed its

part. In the tavern, among groups of men collected on shore from

wind-bound vessels, at gatherings around the cabin fire, and in those

small craft that were constantly going from one part of the bay to

another, not only these tales, but others, irrevocably lost, were

elaborated and made current in days homely and toilsome yet invested

with an atmosphere of romance.

Many of the illustrations in this volume are reproductions from

photographs taken by Mr. R. Eickemeyer, Jr., medallist of the Royal

Photographic Society, on his visits to Long Island. The artistic

excellence of Mr. Eickemeyer's pictures is widely known, and the author,

in appreciation of his interest and kindness, desires to make here

grateful acknowledgment.

Bellport, Long Island,

June 25, 1895.