Cormorant Crag: A Tale of the Smuggling Days

The boys ceased speaking, and became very thoughtful; and, as if to sharpen their ideas, each took out his knife—a long-hafted jack knife such as a sailor uses, fastened by a lanyard to his waist. There was rather a rivalry between them as to which had the biggest, longest-bladed and sharpest knife—a point that was never decided; and the blades had rather a hard time of it, for they were constantly being opened and whetted so as to maintain a razor edge. But, probably from not being expert, these razor-like edges were not maintained, and this was partly due to the selection of the sharpener upon which they were whetted. The sole of a boot is no doubt suitable, but not when it contains nails, which was the case with those worn by the lads. The rail of a gate is harmless, while a smooth piece of slate makes a moderately good enough soft hone. But when it comes to rubbing a blade upon a piece of gneiss, quartz crystal, or granite, the result is most unsatisfactory, the edge of the knife being prone to look like a very bad imitation of a miniature saw. From force of habit each lad on opening his knife looked round for something upon which to give his knife a whet; but up there on the soft turf of a cliff slope whetstones were scarce. Down below on the wave-washed strand boulders and pebbles were plentiful enough, and in addition there was the rock; but from where they were it was a good quarter of a mile to the nearest place where a descent could be safely made. But the next moment Mike found an oyster-shell, upon which he began diligently to rub his blade; while, failing this, Vince pulled his foot across his knee, vigorously stropped his knife on the sole of his boot, and gave a finishing touch to the edge by passing it to and fro upon the palm of his hand. This done, each looked out for something to cut, where there was for some distance round nothing but grass. This Vince began to shave off gently, with Mike watching him for a few moments; but the pursuit seemed to him too trivial, and, after wrinkling up his forehead for a few moments as if perplexed, an idea struck him, and he began to score the soft turf in regular lines, as if it were a loin of pork, but with this difference, that when he had made about a dozen strokes he commenced cutting between the marks, and sloping his blade so that he carved out the turf, leaving a series of ridges and furrows as he went on. This was on his part an ingenious enough way of using the blade, out on an island cliff on a glorious sunny day; but at the end of a minute it became as monotonous as it was purposeless, and Vince shut his knife with a snap, after carefully wiping the blade; while Mike, who had been blunting the point of his by bringing it in contact with the granite, which, where they were, only lay three or four inches beneath the velvet turf, followed suit, after seeing that his knife point would need a good grinding before he could consider it to be in a satisfactory state.