For although legally a member of the Brewster family, Willie explained,
the girl had come to belong in a sense to the entire village. Had she
not been cast an orphan upon its shores, and were not its treacherous
shoals responsible for her misfortune? Wilton, to be sure, was not
actually answerable for the crimes those hidden sand bars perpetrated,
but nevertheless the fisherfolk could not quite shake themselves free
of the shadow cast upon them by the tragedies ever occurring at their
gateway. Too many of their people had gone down to the sea in ships
never to return for them to become callous to the disasters they were
continually forced to witness. The wreck of the _Michleen_ had been
one of the most pathetic of these horrors, and the welfare of the child
who in consequence of it had come into the hamlet's midst had become a
matter of universal concern.
"'Tain't to be wondered at the girl is loved," continued Willie. "At
first people took an interest in her, or tried to, from a sense of
duty, for you couldn't help bein' sorry for the little thing.
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