“I might have been overboard about half an hour when, clearing the salt water out of my eyes, I caught the loom of land ahead, through the darkness, the sight of which greatly cheered me, for I had no doubt of my ability to hold out until I could reach the shore, and I had the comforting conviction that where there was land there was also safety. About an hour later I found myself again among breakers; but they were a mere trifle compared with those that I had already encountered, and shortly afterward my feet touched bottom and, abandoning the fragment of wreckage to which I had been clinging, I crawled up the beach to above high-water mark, flung myself down upon the warm sand, and instantly fell asleep.
“When I awoke the sun was shining brilliantly, and the gale had broken, although it was still blowing a strong breeze. I looked out to seaward, and at once sighted the wreck, about two miles away, dismasted, and hard and fast upon the reef. Then, glancing at my surroundings, I perceived that I had landed upon a beach of fine white sand, backed by country densely wooded, with hills stretching away to north and south. The sight of the trees suggested possibilities of fruit, the thought of which reminded me that I was hungry; and I was about to make a plunge into the woods in search of something to eat when I heard a voice hailing, and, looking in the direction from which the hail had come, I saw, to my great satisfaction, Van Ryn and Fleming, about a quarter of a mile along the beach.
“Naturally we at once joined forces, and, they being like myself, hungry, we forthwith proceeded to hunt for food, speedily finding an abundance of cocoa-nuts that had fallen, ripe, from the trees that lined the inner edge of the beach. We ate and drank our fill of the fruit and milk of the nuts, and then, having meanwhile discussed our plans for the future, we began our quest for a practicable path inland, for the idea of camping on the beach, night after night, had few attractions for us. But the undergrowth was so dense and impenetrable that it was not until we had traversed quite a mile of the beach, under the rays of a scorching sun, that we at length found a spot where, by cutting and hacking the monkey-rope and creepers with our knives, we finally succeeded in working our way into a valley enclosed between two ranges of hills running practically parallel.
“My word! that was hot work, I assure you, Mr Blackburn. Of course there was no lack of shade, but, on the other hand, there was no air. The atmosphere was simply stifling, and what with that and the labour of hewing a way through the dense undergrowth—much of it consisting of bushes covered with tough, sharp thorns that got hold of our clothes, and not infrequently our skins, and refused to let go—the perspiration poured from us like water, and simply drenched our clothes. But the monkey-rope, the creepers, the thorns, and the heat were not the worst of our troubles; the whole place was swarming with mosquitoes that hovered about us in clouds and bit us savagely in a hundred places at once. And, as though these were not enough, there were myriads of small black ants that penetrated our clothing and bit us even more savagely than the mosquitoes. Luckily we did not encounter the ants until we were very nearly through the belt of bush, or we should have been compelled to abandon our attempt.
“Ultimately, however, we effected the passage of the bush, and found ourselves fairly in the valley, with long dry grass, waist-high, plenty of trees, big and little, but not much bush or creeper. And then we encountered potential trouble of a fresh kind, for although we were no longer attacked by ants, we too frequently heard rustlings in the long grass that we presently discovered to be caused by snakes, and we were compelled to walk very warily, lest we should perchance unwittingly tread upon one of the creatures, and be bitten, perhaps fatally, as a punishment. I confess that—well, to put it plainly, I did not half like it; but what were we to do? We were searching for a cave, or shelter of some sort, that would serve us for a lodging and a place of protection in the event of a recurrence of bad weather, and we were not likely to find it by standing still. Also we were looking for food, with a view to the future; but the question of supplies afforded us little anxiety, for banana and plantain trees were abundant in that valley, to say nothing of grapes and several other kinds of fruit. Coming to a banana tree, the fruit of which was fully ripe, we made a good meal, and then, feeling rather tired, we trampled down a smooth place in the grass, under the shade of a big tree, stretched ourselves thereon, and were soon fast asleep.
“Judging from the position of the sun in the heavens, it might be about five o’clock in the afternoon when I was awakened by somebody shaking me by the shoulder, and as I opened my eyes I heard a voice I at once recognised as that belonging to Dirk here, who was saying, in a sort of whisper:—
“‘Hush! don’t make a noise, but just lift your head, cautious, and look.’
“‘Look where?’ I returned, also in a sort of whisper; ‘and what am I to hush for?’
“‘Look to your right, at Pete,’—which is the name by which we usually addressed Fleming—‘lying fast asleep there, and see what you’ll see,’ replied Dirk.
“I turned my head very cautiously and looked; and there, within less than a fathom of me, was Pete Fleming, lying flat on his back, fast asleep, with a snake coiled up like a cable right in the middle of his chest. The snake’s head was resting upon the top flake of his coils, with his cold, cruel eyes gazing straight at us, and his long, black, forked tongue flickering in and out of his mouth in a most suggestively threatening manner.