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 CHAPTER XXXII

THREE MURDERERS

ONE they are. The ledges are quite bare—not a bird to be seen there—nothing but the spray and the wild winds to love them now. It was what I had expected, had been sure of; but again I felt bitter disappointment. It is more than disappointment—a sadness and emptiness of heart at finding these accustomed tenants, that have for days given life and beauty and domestic happiness to the desolate frowning precipice, gone, and their known places void. How I miss them! I retract now what I said before about wild creatures giving no relief to the sense of solitude. These guillemots did, I believe, and I feel lonelier now without them. And so, whilst I lay warm under the bedclothes, were you, you little mite of a guillemot—but stay, I have apostrophised you once already, and am not going to do it again.

There was rain, mist, and wind extraordinary today, but the sea dashed finely over the rocks. The pool, though a haven, was often seething, yet I saw Bottle-nose, and, later, a common seal, in it. The latter was the only one I watched. He came up at intervals of a few minutes only, and, as on former occasions, always rose perpendicularly in the water, with his nose pointed to the sky. In this position he