He also proved a very apt pupil, and before his guest had been fully four months in his island, could speak fairly good English.
So all went well, but the trouble was on ahead. Harry often thought of that, and it gave him many and many an anxious moment.
One day a scout returned from the mainland with news of so startling a nature that—that I cannot do better than defer it for another chapter.
Note 1. The Scottish Highlanders of old used almost invariably to charge in this fashion; as the triangular phalanx neared the foe, pistols were fired, then dashed among them, claymores were then drawn, and while wild slogans rent the air, the charge was delivered, with a vigour and aim that made success all but certain.
Book Four—Chapter Four.
King Kara-Kara’s Armada—The Battle on the Lake—Terrible fighting.
Briefly stated, the news which the scout had brought from the mainland was to the effect that King Kara-Kara, who held the white men at his court as slaves, having heard of the prosperity and wealth of the king of the hundred isles, and that he also owned a white slave, had determined to invade the island territory.