The Pearl Divers and Crusoes of the Sargasso Sea by Gordon Stables

There is no doubt at all that about this time, and for more than a year afterwards, old Antonio, as the village children called him, was _the_ most remarkable man in Fisherton, or in the regions around it.

But even now, after he had settled down in his strange romantic home, there were not wanting people who shook their heads and said --