It was about ten o'clock on a November morning in the little villageof Blea-on-the-Sands. The hamlet was made up of some thirty houses,which clustered together on a low rising ground. The place was verypoor, but some old merchant of bygone days had built in a pious mood alarge church, which was now too great for the needs of the place; thenave had been unroofed in a heavy gale, and there was no money torepair it, so that it had fallen to decay, and the tower was joined tothe choir by roofless walls. This was a sore trial to the old priest,Father Thomas, who had grown grey there; but he had no art ingathering money, which he asked for in a shamefaced way; and thevicarage was a poor one, hardly enough for the old man's needs. So thechurch lay desolate.The village stood on what must once have been an island; the littleriver Reddy, which runs down to the sea, there forking into twochannels on the landward side; towards the sea the ground was bare,full of sand-hills covered with a short grass. Towards the land was asmall wood of gnarled trees, the boughs of which were all brushedsmooth by the gales; looking landward there was the green flat, inwhich the river ran, rising into low hills; hardly a house was visiblesave one or two lonely farms; two or three church towers rose abovethe hills at a long distance away. Indeed Blea was much cut off fromthe world; there was a bridge over the stream on the west side, butover the other channel was no bridge, so that to fare eastward it wasrequisite to go in a boat. To seaward there were wide sands, when thetide was out; when it was in, it came up nearly to the end of thevillage street. The people were mostly fishermen, but there were a fewfarmers and labourers; the boats of the fishermen lay to the east sideof the village, near the river channel which gave some draught ofwater; and the channel was marked out by big black stakes and poststhat straggled out over the sands, like awkward leaning figures, tothe sea's brim.Father Thomas lived in a small and ancient brick house near thechurch, with a little garden attached. He was a kindly man, much wornby age and weather, with a wise heart, and he loved the quiet lifewith his small flock. This morning he had come out of his house tolook abroad, before he settled down to writing his sermon. He lookedout to sea, and saw with a shadow of sadness the black outline of awreck that had come ashore a week before, and over which the whitewaves were now breaking. The wind blew steadily from the north-east,and had a bitter poisonous chill in it, which it doubtless drew fromthe fields of the upper ice. The day was dark and overhung, not withcloud, but with a kind of dreary vapour that shut out the sun. FatherThomas shuddered at the wind, and drew his patched cloak round him. Ashe did so, he saw three figures come up to the vicarage gate. It wasnot a common thing for him to have visitors in the morning, and he sawwith surprise that they were old Master John Grimston, the richest manin the place, half farmer and half fisherman, a dark surly old man;his wife, Bridget, a timid and frightened woman, who found life withher harsh husband a difficult business, in spite of their wealth,which, for a place like Blea, was great; and their son Henry, a sillyshambling man of forty, who was his father's butt. The three walkedsilently and heavily, as though they came on a sad errand.