While I lived on Long Island, I heard a story (not countenanced by George R. Stewart in _American Place-Names_) that Fire Island, the barrier beach, was named after fires built there for that wicked purpose.

I once read (I'm sorry to say I can't remember where) about a monastery located on a dangerous coast, where the monks, if they spied a ship, would not build a fire, but *pray* for it to be wrecked. Si non e vero....