Palm Tree Island Part 3

The seamen who came first to the beach disappeared from our sight behind a number of rocks like to those upon which we sat, and immediately afterwards we heard loud cries of alarm proceeding from that quarter. Those behind hasted on with even greater expedition than before, and when they joined their comrades there arose a perfect chorus of execration, which puzzled us a good deal, until, glancing seaward beyond the rocks that hid the men from our sight, I descried the nose of a boat, and shortly afterwards made out that it was empty.

Without doubt it was one of the two boats we had seen laid up on the beach, and a wave had carried it out to sea, and it was this had provoked the cries we had heard. But I did not see the second boat, and wondered why the men did not put off in this to pursue the truant instead of spending their breath in vain outcries. When some little while had pa.s.sed, and the boat was still drifting out, none pursuing it, I was taken with a great curiosity to see what the reason might be, and descended from my perch to creep towards them, taking care as I went to haul our raft to a safe place on the beach. As for Billy, he refused to budge, saying that he would not go a foot nearer to the men, because he was sure they would do him a mischief, a thing which I could by no means believe, their minds being taken up with other matters.

However, he would not come, so I left him there, and went on alone.

It being my purpose to see without being seen--at least, until I knew what mind the men bore towards us--I went softly, and coming to the rocks beyond which they were, I peeped round one of them with great caution. And then I understood both why they did not pursue the boat and why they had let out so lamentable an outcry. The second of the two boats had a great hole stove in her bottom, without doubt by that huge wave which had well-nigh struck the breath out of us. The men were at their wits' end what to do, for the other boat was drifting further and further from the sh.o.r.e, and was at this time, as I reckoned, at least a hundred yards distant. One of them, as I looked, cried out that he would swim out to it; otherwise they were undone, for they were in peril of being boiled or burnt alive; and he plunged into the water and made a stroke or two. But immediately afterwards another of the men cried out that he saw the fin of a shark, at which the first man--his name was Pumfrey, and he was the s.h.i.+p's carpenter--instantly turned about and swam for the sh.o.r.e, splas.h.i.+ng most vehemently with his arms and legs and bellowing like a bull, as much to frighten away the shark as from fear.

Seeing this their last hope of recovering the boat altogether dashed away, the seamen did nothing but walk to and fro in great agitation of mind, letting forth the most dreadful curses that ever I heard. As for Mr. Bodger, whom I spied among them, he sat down on a rock, being a timorous creature, as I have before said, and setting his face in his hands, groaned and sighed in pitiful fas.h.i.+on, as did those that were sick and wounded among them. It came into my mind--what I had not thought of before--that Billy and me, being partners with them in their unhappy situation, were no better able than they to leave this terrible place, at least with any prospect of success, for I knew very well that our raft would be a poor vessel for any voyage. And since it appeared to be our doom to live or die with them, I saw no benefit that could arise from any attempt to hide our presence. Accordingly I walked round the rock into their midst. It was Wabberley that spied me first, and when he saw me his jaw dropped and his face went green, as having beyond doubt believed me to be now at the bottom of the sea. He uttered a strange cry, which the others hearing, they looked towards him, and at the same instant beheld me, and after a sudden brief silence came running at me, demanding with the greatest eagerness how I had come ash.o.r.e. When I told them, on a raft, they shouted for joy, and Hoggett catching me roughly by the arm, cried to me to say where that same raft was, or he would dash my head against the rocks. I answered that there was no need of threats or violence, for the raft lay but a short distance away, and he might perhaps use it to overtake the boat, and at the same time I pointed to the further rocks. Without more ado he set off at a run, and spying Billy still sitting upon the rock he asked whether we had the captain and Mr. Lummis also with us.

But he did not wait for an answer, running very swiftly until he came to the place where our raft lay, the other men following him in a crowd.

When he saw what a poor shattered thing the raft was, he broke out again into cursing, thinking that it would be useless for his purpose, as indeed it might have been, he being a very ponderous man. But then bethinking himself he catched hold of Billy, and, Joshua Chick coming up, swore that Billy and he, being of no great weight, should go on the raft and pursue the boat, which, as we now perceived, had come into the current that had nearly carried us past the further extremity of the sh.o.r.e. Billy cried out that he would not go, but Hoggett took him by the middle, and when Chick had launched the raft, he threw the boy fairly on to it, bidding Chick fling him into the sea if he made any bones about it. And then, wrenching up two of the planks of the broken boat to serve as paddles, he gave them to the boatswain and Billy, who thereupon began to ply them with the utmost vigour.

We watched them as they went further and further from the sh.o.r.e, the seamen shouting with excitement, and even laying wagers one against another, though, being bereft of everything save their weapons and some few articles that were in the boat, it seemed to me great folly. And when after a long chase the boat was overhauled near the archway in the red rock of which I have spoken, they fell into a perfect ecstasy of joy, clapping each other on the back and shouting like frantic people.

We saw Chick baling out the boat, Billy helping him, and as they were a long while doing this, it was plain that she held a great quant.i.ty of water and would most likely have foundered in no long time. Whilst they were at this work of baling, the raft floated away, and neglecting it they began to pull back to the beach. But they had not taken many strokes before we saw them turn again, and the men around me burst forth into horrible execrations, supposing in the first moment (so base of mind were they, as well as witless) that Chick was purposing to row away and desert them. But I told them that Billy had only remembered the raft, and so it proved, for they rowed after it, and having catched it up, fastened it by a rope to the boat's stern and so headed again towards the sh.o.r.e.

While they were yet some distance off, the ground beneath our feet trembled and we heard a great rumbling, and the sea was mightily troubled, whereupon the men fell into their panic again, fearing that an earthquake would swallow them ere ever they got clear away. They cried in great terror to Chick to haste, and while the boat was yet some fathoms' length from the beach, Wabberley and two or three more dashed into the sea, and wading out, scrambled into the boat, with such violence that they were not very far short of overturning it. Which seeing, all the rest of the seamen rushed to do likewise, Hoggett and some others carrying all the articles that were in the broken boat, and then I saw that the boat, being the smaller of the two, could not possibly contain us all, and indeed the men saw that too, and there was such a fight to win places that I thought the boat would fill with water and sink. As for me, I stood watching in a kind of amazement, now in the mind to rush towards the boat with the others and fight for a place, now deeming it better to wait until I saw to what issue things came.

[Sidenote: Abandoned]

All this time Mr. Bodger had remained by my side, no doubt expecting that he as an officer would be given a place as of right. But now there came a mighty roar from the mountain; more terrible than any we had yet heard, and I saw belching out of it not merely steam and water, but smoke of a lurid darkness, the sky above becoming perfectly black with a shower of ashes shot forth from the top, intermixed with fire.

At this the fight about the boat waxed still more violent, and Mr.

Bodger, darting from my side, sprang out into the sea. Then I saw Hoggett fling Billy out of the boat, and three or four of the weaker men who had been beaten from it mounted on to the raft, upon which also Mr. Bodger scrambled in his desperate haste. The men upon it, finding it likely to sink with the weight of them all, thrust him back again into the water, and I heard him scream with terror when, striving to regain his place, and clinging desperately to the edge of the raft, they beat upon him with their fists and sought to loosen his hold. He was on the point of being cast off when Hoggett, in the boat, which now stood some little way off, shouted "Take him aboard, you fools; we may want him," and they did as he said, though grumbling, one of them saying that Hoggett was safe himself, and had taken mighty great care not to overload _his_ craft.

And then, as Billy came out of the water towards me, and I saw both the boat and the raft moving away, and knew that we were to be left alone on this dreadful sh.o.r.e, with the volcano vomiting forth fire--then, I say, I was shaken out of the amazement which had held me, and being perfectly frantic with terror, I rushed into the water, thinking nothing of Billy or aught else than my own safety. With desperate strokes I swam after the boat, shouting to the men to take me aboard.

She was moving but slowly, being greatly overladen, and having the raft in tow, so that I was able to overtake the latter. But the men cried that there was no room on it, and commanded me roughly to sheer off, and when I still clung to it, one lifted the plank that had been used as a paddle, and aimed a furious blow at my head. The violence of his movement causing the raft to sink towards one side, he failed of his brutal design, yet not wholly; for the plank as it descended grazed the side of my head, inflicting such a cut that I was well-nigh stunned, and was forced to loose my hold. I tried to set to swimming again, but my strength was gone from me, and in my daze I might have gone to the bottom if Billy had not swum after me. With his help I was able to reach the sh.o.r.e, and when we stood up on the dry land and saw that the seamen had beyond doubt abandoned us, we flung ourselves down on our faces, in all the misery of wild despair.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "ONE LIFTED THE PLANK ... AND AIMED A FURIOUS BLOW AT ME."]

CHAPTER THE FIFTH

OF CLAMS AND COCOA-NUTS AND SUNDRY OUR DISCOVERIES; AND OF OUR REFLECTIONS ON OUR FORLORN STATE

I think I lay for a time in a kind of lethargy, for I was perfectly unconscious of anything that might be happening about me, and it seemed to me that my mind was a total blank. Whether it was the heat of the sun, which had mounted well-nigh to the zenith, or the pangs of hunger that roused me, I know not; but when I did arise I was aware of a prodigious aching in my inwards, which was very natural, seeing that I had not eaten for sixteen or twenty hours. And then I discovered that Billy had risen first; indeed he told me that he had not lain long, being not near so much overcome as I was, his harder life having indurated as well his feelings as his skin. When I beheld him he was a hundred yards or more away, sitting on a low flat rock, and eating with a great appearance of relish. Seeing me get to my feet, he called to me to come and eat likewise, and when I reached his rock I found a great array of sh.e.l.ls beside him, some broke apart and empty, others still closed up.

[Sidenote: Clams and Cocoa-nuts]

"They ain't bad, master," he said, for so he commonly called me, "but they do make a body uncommon dry."

I was amazed, and indeed almost angry, because he seemed so comfortable, not reflecting that after the dog's life he had led aboard the _Lovey Susan_ his present posture was, at least, one of ease and security, the mountain having done no harm as yet. My gorge rose when I saw him take out the slimy inhabitants of the sh.e.l.ls and eat them raw; I had never eaten sh.e.l.l-fish at all, much less uncooked, and for all my famishment my stomach refused this sort of food. The horror of our situation smote upon my mind: here were we, little more than boys, left on a strange sh.o.r.e with no food but what we could pick up, no clothes but what we stood in--and they were but s.h.i.+rt and breeches, for the coats we had used as a sail had been washed from the raft when the great wave struck us--and no implements or tools of any kind, not so much as a jack-knife. As yet we knew nothing of the land whereupon we had been cast, though I guessed it must be an island, but whether large or small, peopled or desolate, fertile or barren, all remained to be discovered. The sum of our knowledge was that we were at the foot of a burning mountain, and that was a very terrible thing to contemplate.

The thought of it drew me to look aloft at the summit, where there still hung a cloud of steam, though not so large as before, and the fire and smoke had ceased, but a stream of hot water was still flowing down the side, yet not in a great volume.

The sky was now very clear, and my head being uncovered, I found the heat of the sun very discommoding, and withal my throat was parched, and I had a great thirst, though Billy's must have been greater after the salt things he had been eating. When he saw me turn from them with loathing, he got up and said that we had better find a spring of fresh water, so we walked along the hard beach, going to the right hand with the design to ascend to the woods above, where I thought we might find a spring, and certainly shelter from the sun. Billy groaned as the sharp edges cut his bare feet; nevertheless he would not suffer me to go alone, for which I was sorry, for when we had gone a little way we came to some cliffs, which rose up so straight and forbidding that we did not think fit to scale them, at least until we had sought an easier way. Accordingly we went back again, crossing the stream of hot water, which was now only trickling, and so continued until the lava ended at the strip of sandy beach. I was now minded to strike up from the sh.o.r.e, but was a little timid of approaching so near the course of the hot flood, not knowing but that we might meet another torrent and suffer a scalding. But, having come to the end of the sand, we arrived at more cliffs, which, though not so high as the first, were no less steep, so that we had to make a choice between scaling them and ascending by the lava slope. Taking counsel with Billy, I determined to venture on this latter, hoping that before we had gone far, we might find a means of reaching the woods either on the right hand or the left.

When we had gone a good way up, very toilsomely, I saw with great thankfulness a slope to our left hand, which seemed to lead away from the barren lava to living soil. We struck up this and found ourselves by and by on a mossy plateau, on which Billy danced, so joyful was he at feeling so soft a carpet beneath his feet. The wood was just beyond us, not above a hundred yards away. When we came to it we were pretty well blown, and exceeding hot, having never rested nor even looked back since we left the beach. But now we bethought us to turn and gaze over the sea, having some hope--at least I had--that the seamen might even at the last have repented and put back to take us off. We saw the boat indeed, but it was a mere speck, and the raft we could not see at all, being in doubt whether it had sunk, or whether it was only the distance that made it invisible. But far beyond the boat, we saw a dark line which a landsman might have supposed to be a cloud, but which we, our eyes being accustomed to ranging over wide s.p.a.ces, knew at once to be land. It did not seem likely that the seamen could yet have discovered it, since it had escaped us when we were at the sea level; I considered it to be a happy chance for them that they had directed their course so truly, though when I said so to Billy, he said he hoped they would find the land full of cannibals, who would cook and eat them all, and Hoggett first. This mention of cannibals set up an apprehensiveness in my mind, and I was chary of entering the wood, lest we came upon savages, but Billy said very st.u.r.dily, that savages or no savages, he must drink, and so went on among the trees, with me close at his heels.

We looked about us eagerly, both for water and for fruits wherewith to stay our hunger: but as for the former we saw none, and for the latter, though we saw many plants bearing berries, and some trees with fruits hanging upon them, we did not recognize at first any that we had seen on the island where we recruited, and durst not, hungry as we were, attempt anything strange lest they should be poisonous, and our first meal prove our last. At one point we were startled by a small animal leaping across our path, and Billy, crying it was a rabbit, without thinking dashed after it, a very useless thing to do; but it had this good result, that, tumbling headlong over something, he picked himself up ruefully, and then shouted with delight, the obstacle being a large cocoa-nut which had fallen from a tree. We were in a quandary at first how to break it open, having no knife or other tool to pierce the husk; but Billy bethought him of the buckles on our belts, and taking these off, we cut and sc.r.a.ped at the husk until we came to the inner nut, and then broke this open by hammering it very hard against the tree-trunk, finding it the more easily breakable because it was over ripe; and though we lost some of the liquid thereby, there remained enough to furnish us with a very refres.h.i.+ng draught.

While I was digging my teeth ravenously into the kernel, Billy s.h.i.+nned up the stem, which was straight like the mast of a s.h.i.+p, to obtain some more of this precious fruit. Having cast down two or three at my feet, he cried out that he was going to the masthead to take a look round.

He went almost to the very top, and when he came down, told me that the hill we were on was not the highest in the island, the highest being the mountain, whose peak was still covered by the cloud of steam; but except what might be hidden by this mountain, he could see all the rest of the island, which by his reckoning could not be above two miles long. He told me of the high red rock which we had seen through the archway as we approached the land, and which lay now on our right hand.

On the left he discovered a little bay, with a strip of yellow sand, though he could not tell how wide this was because of the cliffs.

Beyond the bay the land went to a point, and beyond this again, some distance out in the sea, were two red rocks, not very large, standing up like the posts of a gate, or, as I thought when I myself saw them, like sentinels. All the country to the left of the burning mountain--that is, to the west--was covered with vegetation, either woods or gra.s.ses, which I was very glad to hear, since there was promise of food, at least of the vegetable kind. I concluded that the streams of lava cast forth by the mountain had flowed only towards the beach at which we had landed, or at any rate had flowed no other way for a long time, since otherwise the land could not have been so fruitful. I asked Billy anxiously whether he had seen any wild beasts, or any sign of the habitation of men; but he said that he had seen neither the one nor the other, but only some birds, at which I was vastly relieved.

We sat for some while appeasing our appet.i.tes, scarcely speaking, for Billy was not a talkative boy, and I was still too much under the oppression of our lonely situation. All at once I set up a laugh, at which Billy stopped munching at his cocoa-nut and looked at me in astonishment.

"Oh, Billy," I said, "if you had catched that rabbit, what could we have done with it?"

"Why, eat it, to be sure," says Billy. "I like rabbit meat."

(We knew afterwards that there were no rabbits on the island, and thought the animal we had seen must be a rat, though it did not run like one.)

"But how could we cook it?" I said.

At that he looked startled, and felt again in his pocket, which, as I have said, was empty. He had quite forgot that we had neither flint, steel, nor tinder, so that we had no means of making a fire. He looked very sober for a s.p.a.ce, and then reminded me that we had seen the savages make fire at the island where we stayed, by the very rapid twirling of a stick, and he was sure he could do the like. However, there was no need of a fire at that time, for the very good reason that we had nothing to cook, and so we fell to again on our cocoa-nuts, and ate a great quant.i.ty before we were satisfied. We saw that we had come into a grove of those useful trees, and with their fruit, and the sh.e.l.l-fish on the sh.o.r.e, which if it came to a pinch I must eat raw, as Billy had done, we should be in no immediate danger of famis.h.i.+ng. We saw about us, too, many birds which we might eat if we could only snare them and make a fire, though they were quite strange to both of us, excepting parrots. The most of them were something larger than a sparrow, but with brighter plumage, and they came flying about us very tamely, yet never near enough to catch.

Though we had no anxiety for the present in the matter of food, I was still far from easy in mind about our situation, for there might be wild beasts and men on the island, though we had not as yet seen any, and I was troubled about our utter defencelessness. So after we had eaten our fill and rested a while, I thought it behoved us to go through the wood and see what there might be on the other side.

Accordingly we got up, feeling plaguy stiff from the many wettings we had had, though the sun had dried our clothes, and went on until we came to the edge of the wood, where we found another slope very much steeper than the first, fairly open, but with saplings growing here and there. Before we descended I bethought me it were well to have some weapon in our hand in case we should meet any enemy, man or beast, so Billy swarmed up a tree and broke off two branches, which, when stripped of their twigs and leaves, made very fair clubs, though to be sure of a rough appearance, and little likely to avail us much if we encountered men in any wise armed. Still they were better than nothing, and with these in our hands we descended the slope until we came to another thick wood, which stretched on our right hand half way or more to the summit of the smoking mountain. We went through this wood, which differed very little from the first, and then all at once we came upon a s.h.i.+ning sheet of water, above two hundred yards long and near as broad, with a few ducks swimming on it. The moment Billy saw this he let forth a great shout, and bounded towards it, falling on his knees and drinking very heartily. I was as glad as he was, for the juice of cocoa-nuts is very agreeable, but not near so good as water for quenching the thirst; but I was not so quick as Billy, nor did I gulp it so eagerly, but took a mouthful and tasted it before drinking more. The water was cool and seemed to me good to drink, though it had a taste like the sulphur water my aunt Susan always gave to us in the spring; she said it cleared our skin. I drank a few mouthfuls more, and then we went on, skirting the base of the mountain on the further side.

[Sidenote: Wood and Water]

We found the ground here very rough; indeed, nowhere on the island, as we afterwards discovered when we came to explore it thoroughly, did we find a stretch of level ground above twenty yards in length, even in the parts where the vegetation was thickest. There were not many trees growing on this side of the mountain, but we continued our journey in as near a straight line as we could, observing more woods on our right hand which I thought to examine another day. At length we came to a high cliff overlooking the sea, and when we came to the top of it, suddenly we saw towering over us the monstrous red rock of which we had already had a glimpse when we first drew near to the sh.o.r.e. It rose sheer out of the sea to the height of four or five hundred feet, as I guessed, and was very broad too; at least, the side that fronted us was, being full a quarter of a mile long. Between the rock and the cliff on which we stood there was a narrow strait, through which the sea rushed at a furious pace. I felt quite dizzy as I gazed down upon it from our great height, though Billy, being used to climbing to the masthead, went to the very edge of the cliff and stood there without the least tremor. Indeed, he gave me a fright by saying that he would leap across the strait to a ledge that jutted out from the rock towards our island, approaching so near to it that he declared he could do it easy; but I sprang to him and pulled him back, overcome with horror at the thought of the terrible risk he would run and his dreadful death if he missed his footing, and also of my solitude if I lost my only companion.

I now saw that his face was very pale, and I thought that he was frightened at his own daring; but he suddenly bent his body double, and when I asked him what was the matter he said that he had a very bad pain.

"That comes of eating those slimy things raw," I said. "I didn't eat any."

He made no answer, but flung himself on the ground, groaning, and I stood over him, condoling with him, and very much concerned lest he was poisoned. I had stood thus for the s.p.a.ce of a minute or two, when all at once I felt a terrible pain myself, and soon was beside him, groaning full as loud as he. Since I had eaten none of the sh.e.l.l-fish, and cocoa-nuts had never done us any harm before, I concluded, when I was able to think, that our sufferings were caused by the sulphurous water of the lake, which indeed turned out to be the true explanation; for after we had drunk of it next day we were both afflicted with the same violent colic, so that we resolved never to taste it again. Billy was worse than me, having drunk the greater quant.i.ty, and it was a good while before we were able to stand, and then we trembled so much and felt so weak that we wished for nothing but to lie down and sleep. And that put us on thinking of what we should do in the night. We had come so slowly across the island that the sun was already sinking, and we must needs find some secure place for repose before darkness fell upon us. We were both used to discomforts aboard the _Lovey Susan_, but there we had at least a bunk or a hammock and security from all but the storm, whereas here there was no shelter save the woods, and we did not know what strange perils might beset us there. And I know not whether 'twas the oncoming of the dark that made me more fearful, but certain it is that I found myself looking about me timorously, and at one point I was so sure that I saw a man that I clutched Billy hard by the arm and whispered him to look too. Which doing, he cried out in a perfectly loud voice, "Why, master, 'tis but an old stump of a tree.

'Tain't nothing to be scared on." Billy, I will say now, was never affrighted at imaginary perils so much as at real ones.

[Sidenote: Night]

We had to consider, I say, of how we should pa.s.s the night. I was not the least disposed to trudge back over the island, and indeed there was no need, for no part, so far as I knew, was better than any other; in short, we were both pretty tired, so that we determined to take shelter in a small wood on the edge of the cliff on the opposite side of the burning mountain from that where the lava had flowed. Our entrance caused a great disturbance among the birds, which flew out in great flocks and making shrill cries. We saw some brown rats, too, scuttering among the undergrowth, and these put Billy in mind of the rats in the _Lovey Susan_, which sometimes ran across the face of the seamen in the forecastle when they slept.

"I don't like them things, master," he said, "and we'd best climb up into a tree and sleep on a bough."

But it seemed to me that a bough of a tree would be a most uneasy resting-place; I should a.s.suredly lose my balance and topple to the ground, though Billy, being accustomed to dizzy perches in the rigging of the _Lovey Susan_, might find it comfortable enough. Yet I had no mind for a lodging on the ground, without any defence from rats, to say nothing of wild animals, of which there might be some on the island, though we had not seen any. We talked about it for some time, and the end of it was that we set about collecting some broken branches that lay on the ground, and snapped off others that were within our reach, and so piled up a little shelter round about a thick trunk. By the time we had finished this work it was perfectly dark within the wood.

We sat ourselves down on the mossy carpet, with our cudgels close to our hands, and then, bethinking us of the custom of setting watches on board s.h.i.+p, we determined that one of us should watch while the other slept. Being the older, I took the first watch, and Billy was soon fast asleep, and I sat very melancholy by him, thinking of our lonely situation, and of my good uncle and aunt at home, whose thoughts were, I doubt not, fondly busy about me.

There was no way whereby I might tell the time, and it might have been two hours or three had pa.s.sed when, feeling my head very heavy, I waked Billy and told him to take his turn, which he did very willingly, though he rubbed his eyes and yawned in the manner of one who has not had his sleep out. In the midst of my slumber I was wakened by Billy grasping my arm, and when I sat up, he whispered to me, as if greatly affrighted, to listen. Since I heard nothing but the rustling of the wind in the trees, it having got up while I slept, I thought that Billy must have fallen into a doze and been visited by a nightmare. But all at once there came a strange howling sound, that seemed to be near at hand, and then it went into the distance, at one moment being quite low and soft, the next very loud, though it never altered in pitch. We clutched our cudgels and sat very close to each other, and Billy whispered that he felt a cold s.h.i.+ver running down his back, as I myself did, but I forbore to tell him so. The sound was very dreadful, as of some creature in agony, though it was not the least like any sound I had ever heard before, except once, when I heard a man tuning, as they say, the organ in our parish church; and falling upon our ears in pitchy darkness it made us very uneasy, as you may think. We were too much affrighted to rise and seek for the cause of it, even if it had been possible to find it in the dark; and so we listened to it, huddled thus together, for a very long time, as it seemed, until, being quite overcome with fatigue, we both fell asleep, and so remained until morning light without keeping any guard.

[Sidenote: Wild Dogs]

I awoke first, and was instantly aware of a scratching at some part of our barricade of branches. I sat up, grasping my cudgel, and in a moment, it being broad daylight, I saw a little opening in the barricado, and the nose of some animal pus.h.i.+ng through it. I lifted up my cudgel and, thrusting myself forward, aimed a blow at the intruder so well that I hit him clean upon the point of the nose. There was a sudden yelp and a snarl, and the nose withdrew itself, and when we sprang to our feet--Billy having wakened at the sound--we spied a pack of small dogs, above a score, at some little distance from our shelter.

They were of a strange kind, the like of which neither Billy nor I had ever seen, being of a yellowish brown in colour, and with smooth coats, not hairy like our dogs at home. Billy roared at them, asking whether it was they that had made such uproar in the night; and when they did not budge, but only looked at him without the least alarm, we both sprang over our fence and ran towards them, brandis.h.i.+ng our cudgels and shouting very fiercely. Then they turned tail, and ran away yelping and snarling; but as soon as we stopped, thinking that we had put them to flight, instantly they stopped also, and sitting upon their haunches, gazed at us very solemnly again.

They did not offer to attack us, and, being of a small size, we did not fear them as if they were great hounds or mastiffs; but the very number of them making us somewhat uneasy, we set forward again to drive them away. It happened as at first: they ran while we ran, but the moment we stopped, they came to a stand also and gazed upon us in the same saucy manner as before. Billy shook his fist at them, and called them by a foul name which he had learnt, I suppose, from the rough seamen of the _Lovey Susan_; but I will say this, that on my telling him it was not a pretty word, he immediately promised never to use it again, since it offended me, and I never heard it from his lips but once after, which I will speak of in course, if I remember.

But to return to our dogs: when we saw that it was useless to pursue them, though we could scare them easily enough, we determined to go on our way as if they were not there. And as you may believe, we set our course first for the cocoa-nut grove, being amazing hungry, and as we went thither we saw some trees of the bread-fruit, and Billy climbed one of them, the trunk being no more than two feet thick, and threw one fruit at me and another at the dogs, which had still followed us, d.o.g.g.i.ng us, as we say. They scampered after it as it rolled down the hill, like as kittens chase a ball of worsted, which amused Billy very much. As for me, I picked up the fruit he had cast at my feet--it was near two pounds weight, I should think--and having broken the rind, not without difficulty, for it was very tough, I tasted the milky juice and afterwards the pulp, but found them both so unpleasing that I cast it from me, very sorrowfully, for it seemed that we should never have any other food but cocoa-nuts, unless we could devise some means of cooking. We went on thence until we came to the palms, the dogs following us again, except two that found the fruit I had thrown away, and they stayed for a while sniffing at it, but finding it as unpalatable as I had done, they by and by left it and joined the pack.