What or who could this person be? were the prevailing questions; and what was his reason for concealing himself from us in the thick woods of the island?
In the thorough exploration of the latter, caused by these episodes, our people fortunately discovered a fine grove of banana trees, and returned laden with their yellow and luscious fruit.
At the same time Tattooed Tom found some letters "in a foreign lingo," as he said, cut on the face of a steep rock, overhanging the river, which formed the cascade at the beach. To this rock he conducted Hislop and me next day, and after tearing aside some masses of creepers and scraping off a rich coating of moss, we found this old legend on the smoothed face of the basalt:
EL NOBLE CABALLERO, D. ALPHONSO DE ALBUQUERQUE;
A. D. 1506.
RVGVEN A DIOS FOR EL.
"The year of the discovery of the island!" said Hislop.
"Have other eyes ever seen this inscription since?" added I.
"It is very doubtful. This Alphonso also discovered the Albuquerque Kays, as he named the three islets which lie off the Mosquito shore in the Caribbean Sea."
Hislop copied the inscription into his notebook, and just as we turned to leave the spot, a large stone about sixty pounds in weight, came crashing down the cliff, hurled apparently from its summit, and if so, by no inexpert hand, for it struck the rock of the legend within a foot of where Hislop stood, and was shivered into a hundred pieces, covering him over with dust.
Had it struck him instead, he had been slain and mangled on the spot. Had a fragment broken any of his limbs, in how miserable a plight would he have been on that desolate island, without proper shelter or surgical aid!
Looking up to the summit of the cliff, which was about a hundred and fifty feet in height, I perceived among the dense fringe of wild gourds, shrubs, leaves, and plantain trees, then waving in the wind, something like a human face, that, after peering over at us, was suddenly withdrawn.