Chapter Twenty Four.
I awoke the next morning quite recovered from my illness of the day before, and was out of the cabin before Mrs Reichardt, who still remained behind the screen which she had put up after I had gone to sleep. It was a beautiful morning, the water was smooth, and merely rippled with a light breeze, and the sun shone bright. I felt well and happy. I lighted a fire to broil the fish for breakfast, as there was a sufficiency left, and then got my fishing-lines ready to catch some larger fish to re-inhabit my pond at the bathing-pool. Mrs Reichardt came out of the cabin and found me playing with Nero.
“Good morning, dear mother,” said I, for I felt most kindly towards her.
“Good morning, my dear boy,” replied she. “Are you quite well?”
“Quite well; and I have got my lines all ready; for I have been thinking that until the birds come, we must live on fish altogether, and we can only take them in fine weather like this; so we must not lose such a day.”
“Certainly not. As soon as we have breakfasted, we will go down and fish. I can fish very well, I am used to it. We must both work now; but first go for your Bible, that we may read a little.”
I did so, and after she had read a chapter, she prayed, and I knelt by her side; then we breakfasted, and as soon as we had breakfasted, we set off to the bathing-pool.
“Do you know if they left anything behind them, Frank?”
“Yes,” replied I, “they left some oars, I believe, and a long line, and we have the shovel and the hammer, and the boat’s small sail, up at the cabin.”
“Well, we shall see very soon,” replied she, as we went down the path.
When we arrived at the bathing-pool, the first thing that met my eyes made me leap with joy. “Oh! Mother! Mother! They’ve left the iron pot; I did so long for it; and as I lay awake this morning, I thought that if I prayed for anything, it would be for the iron pot. I was tired of dried birds, and they ate so different when they were boiled up in the pot with potatoes.”
“I am equally glad, Frank, for I do not like victuals uncooked; but now let us first see what else they have thrown out of the boat.”
“Why, they have put on shore three of the little casks of water,” said I; “they took them all on board.”
“They have so, I suppose, because the boat was too heavy, and they would not part with the liquor. Foolish men, they will now not have more than six days’ water, and will suffer dreadfully.”
We then looked round the rocks and found that they had left the iron kettle, three breakers, five oars, and a harpoon and staffs; a gang-board, a whale-line of 200 fathoms, an old saw, a bag of broad-headed nails, and two large pieces of sheet-iron.
“That saw may be very useful to us,” said Mrs Reichardt, “especially as you have files in your chests. Indeed, if we want them, we may convert one half of the saw into knives.”
“Into knives! How?”
“I will show you; and these pieces of sheet-iron I could use again. You see the sheet-iron was put on to repair any hole which might be made in the boat, and they have thrown it out, as well as the hammer and nails. I wonder at John Gough permitting it.”
“I heard them quarrelling with him as I came out yesterday to fetch you down; they would not mind what he said.”
“No, or we should not have been left here,” replied she; “John Gough was too good a man to have allowed it, if he could have prevented it. That sheet-iron will be very useful. Do you know what for? To broil fish on, or anything else. We must turn up the corners with the hammer. But now we must lose no more time, but fish all day long, and not think of eating till supper-time.”
Accordingly we threw out our lines, and the fish taking the bait freely, we soon hauled in more than a dozen large fish, which I put into the bathing-pool.
“What use can we make of that long line which they have left?”
“A good many; but the best use we can make of it, is to turn it into fishing-lines, when we require new ones.”
“But how can we do that, it is so thick and heavy?”
“Yes, but I will show you how to unlay it, and then make it up again. Recollect, Frank, that I have been the wife of a Missionary, and have followed my husband wherever he went; sometimes we have been well off, sometimes as badly off as you and I are now—for a Missionary has to go through great dangers, and great hardships, as you would acknowledge if you ever heard my life, or rather that of my husband.”
“Won’t you tell it to me?”
“Yes, perhaps I will, some day or another; but what I wish to point out to you now is, that being his wife, and sharing his danger and privation, I have been often obliged to work hard and to obtain my living as I could. In England, women do little except in the house, but a Missionary’s wife is obliged to work with the men, and as a man very often, and therefore learns to do many things of which women in general are ignorant. You understand now?”
“Oh yes. I have thought already that you appear to know more than Jackson did.”
“I should think not; but Jackson was not fond of work I expect, and I am. And now, Frank, you little thought that when you so tardily went to work the other day to plant potatoes for the benefit of any one that might hereafter come to the island, that you were planting for yourself, and would reap the benefit of your own kind act; for if you had not assisted, of course I could not have done it by myself: so true it is, that even in this world you are very often rewarded for a good action.”
“But are not you always?”
“No, my child, you must not expect that; but if not rewarded in this world, you will be rewarded in the next.”
“I don’t understand that.”
“I suppose that you hardly can, but I will explain all that to you, if God spare my life; but it must be at a more seasonable time.”
We continued fishing till late in the afternoon, by which time had taken twenty-eight large fish, about seven to nine pounds weight; Mrs Reichardt then proposed that we should leave off, as we had already provision for a fortnight.
I hauled out one more fish, which she took with her to cook for our supper, and having coiled up my lines, I then commenced, as she had told me to do, carrying up the articles left by the boat’s crew at the bathing-pool. The first thing I seized upon was the coveted iron kettle; I was quite overjoyed at the possession of this article, and I had good reason to be. In my other hand I carried the saw and the bag of nails. As soon as I had deposited them at the cabin, I went down again, and before supper was ready I had brought up everything except the three breakers of water, which I left where they were, as we did not want them for present use, whatever we might hereafter. We were both rather tired, and were glad to go to bed after we had taken our supper.