Halfway up to the top he pauses and looks over the fruit-trees and the tiles and chimney-pots below him, to the bright blue waters of the bay, with Kettleness beyond, now all pink and red in the golden light of late afternoon.  This scene is more suggestive of the Mediterranean than Yorkshire, for the blueness of the sea seems almost unnatural, and the golden greens of the pretty little gardens among the houses seem perhaps a trifle theatrical; but the fisher-folk play their parts too well, and there is nothing make-believe about the delicious bread-and-butter and the newly-baked cakes which accompany the tea awaiting us in a spotlessly clean cottage close by.

The same form of disaster which destroyed Kettleness village caused the complete ruin of Runswick in 1666, for one night, when some of the fisher-folk were holding a wake over a corpse, they had unmistakable warnings of an approaching landslip.  The alarm was given, and the villagers, hurriedly leaving their cottages, saw the whole place slide downwards and become a mass of ruins.  No lives were lost, but, as only one house remained standing, the poor fishermen were only saved from destitution by the sums of money collected for their relief.

Architecturally speaking, Hinderwell is a depressing village, and there is little to remember about the place except an extraordinary block of two or three shops, suitable only for a business street in a big city, but dumped right into the middle of this village of low cottages.  The church is modern enough to be uninteresting, but in the graveyard St. Hilda’s Well, from which the name Hinderwell is a corruption, may still be seen.

In 1603 there was a sudden and terrible outbreak of plague in the village.  It only lasted from September 1 to November 10, but in that short time forty-nine people died.  It seems that the infection was brought by some men from a ‘Turkey ship’ that had been stranded on the coast, but, strangely enough, the disease does not appear to have been carried into the other villages in the neighbourhood.

Scarcely two miles from Hinderwell is the fishing-hamlet of Staithes, wedged into the side of a deep and exceedingly picturesque beck.  Here—­and it is the same at Runswick—­one is obliged to walk warily during the painter’s season, for fear of either obstructing the view of the man behind the easel you have just passed, or out of regard for the feelings of some girls just in front.  There are often no more chances of standing still in Staithes than may be enjoyed on a popular golf-links on a fine Saturday afternoon.  These folk at Staithes do not disturb one with cries of ‘Fore!’ but with that blank Chinaman’s stare which comes to anyone who paints in public.