Tandy made Bob drop it, which he did, and it ran squealing back to its mother. The boar, or king pig, said he accepted the apology, and would now withdraw his forces. And he accordingly did so by scuttling off again into the bush. These wild dwarf-pigs and a species of rock-rabbit were, they found afterwards, about the only animals of any size the island contained.
After this trifling adventure they fought their way through a terrible entanglement of bush, till they reached the foot of the hill.
The men had brought saws and axes with them, and were thus enabled by cutting here and whacking there to make a tolerably good road. When they reached the hill they found themselves in a woodland of beautiful trees. Walking was now easy enough, and in about an hour’s time they reached the summit of the hill and sat down to luncheon.
Eager eyes were watching their progress from the ship, for the upper part of this mount was covered only with stunted grass and beautiful heaths, among which they noticed many a charmingly-coloured lizard—green with crimson markings, or pale blue and orange—but they saw no snakes.
Tandy turned his glass now upon the barque, and there sure enough was Nelda with the Admiral by her side. He waved his coat, and twice he fired his gun. From the hill on which they stood the view was lovely beyond compare. They could see well into the highland part of the island, with its rolling woods, on which the fingers of autumn had already traced beauty tints; its bosky glens; its rugged rocks and hills; its streaks of silvery streams; the lake lying down yonder in the hollow, with something like a floating garden in its centre; and afar off the vast expanse of ocean.
Look which way they would, that sea was all before them, only dotted here and there far to the northward with islands much smaller than the one on which they stood.
High up on the top of the volcanic hill a white cloud was resting, and its dark sides were seamed with many a waving line, the channels down which lava must have run during some recent eruption.
“Ha!” said Halcott presently, “now I can understand the mystery of the burned forest. At first, when we landed here, we believed that the black-birders had been ahead of us; but no, Tandy, no, it was nothing but the lava that fired the forest.”
But strangely enough, however, not a sign of human life was anywhere visible.
Was there any way of accounting for this? “What is your theory, Halcott?” said Tandy. Halcott was lying on the green turf, fanning himself with his broad hat.