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BOOK VI THE DRUNKEN STEERSMAN AND THE SOBER CAPTAIN I THE DOUVRES At about five leagues out , in the open sea , to the south of Guernsey , opposite Pleinmont Point , and between the Channel Islands and St . Malo , there is a group of rocks , called the Douvres . The spot is dangerous . This term Douvres , applied to rocks and cliffs , is very common . There is , for example , near the Côtes du Nord , a Douvre , on which a lighthouse is now being constructed , a dangerous reef ; but one which must not be confounded with the rock above referred to . The nearest point on the French coast to the Douvres is Cape Bréhat . The Douvres are a little further from the coast of France than from the nearest of the Channel Islands . The distance from Jersey may be pretty nearly measured by the extreme length of Jersey . If the island of Jersey could be turned round upon Corbière , as upon a hinge , St . Catherine’s Point would almost touch the Douvres , at a distance of more than four leagues . In these civilised regions the wildest rocks are rarely desert places . Smugglers are met with at Hagot , custom - house men at Binic , Celts at Bréhat , oyster - dredgers at Cancale , rabbit - shooters at Césambre or Cæsar’s Island , crab - gatherers at Brecqhou , trawlers at the Minquiers , dredgers at Ecréhou , but no one is ever seen upon the Douvres . The sea birds alone make their home there . No spot in the ocean is more dreaded . The Casquets , where it is said the Blanche Nef was lost ; the Bank of Calvados ; the Needles in the Isle of Wight ; the Ronesse , which makes the coast of Beaulieu so dangerous ; the sunken reefs at Préel , which block the entrance to Merquel , and which necessitates the red - painted beacon in twenty fathoms of water , the treacherous approaches to Etables and Plouha ; the two granite Druids to the south of Guernsey , the Old Anderlo and the Little Anderlo , the Corbière , the Hanways , the Isle of Ras , associated with terror in the proverb : “ Si jamais tu passes le Ras , Si tu ne meurs , tu trembleras . ” the Mortes - Femmes , the Déroute between Guernsey and Jersey , the Hardent between the Minquiers and Chousey , the Mauvais Cheval between Bouley Bay and Barneville , have not so evil a reputation . It would be preferable to have to encounter all these dangers , one after the other , than the Douvres once . In all that perilous sea of the Channel , which is the Egean of the West , the Douvres have no equal in their terrors , except the Paternoster between Guernsey and Sark . From the Paternoster , however , it is possible to give a signal — a ship in distress there may obtain succour . To the north rises Dicard or D’Icare Point , and to the south Grosnez . From the Douvres you can see nothing . Its associations are the storm , the cloud , the wild sea , the desolate waste , the uninhabited coast . The blocks of granite are hideous and enormous — everywhere perpendicular wall — the severe inhospitality of the abyss .
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