Essay: “The Adventure of the Headland”, William Hope Hodgson, 1912.
This is the second story with Captain Jat, “that unabashed length of lean, pirate-hearted avarice and grim whimsies” . It’s an enjoyable quest for treasure with Captain Jat, and the much put upon Cabin-boy Phibby Tawles, again frequently abused by the Captain.
Tawles manages to really best Captain Jat in this one and come away with more buried treasure than him. The menace of this story is the giant wild dogs on the island and the priests who run with them on all fours. Again, Hodgson gives us a menace that is not supernatural but still strange. In particular, those priests are another Hodgsonian mixture of human with something alien.
MarzAat 