Their island home

Of the genius manifested by Rudolph Wyss, Jules Verne had much more than a double portion. An Island was ever his spiritual home and no one, not even Robert Louis Stevenson, was ever happier upon one. "Their Island Home" is a satisfactory sequel to "The Swiss Family Robinson" because it is essentially the spontaneous production of an original genius set in activity by something outside itself. Wherever "The Swiss Family Robinson" is read—and that is everywhere—"Their Island Home" and "The Castaways of the Flag" should be read. In French they are already established classics. I hope that in this English translation they will prove equally enduring.

Cranstoun Metcalfe.

CHAPTER I

SHOTS ASHORE AND SHOTS AT SEA!

The dry season set in at the beginning of the second week of October. This is the first spring month in the Southern zone. The winter in this nineteenth degree of latitude between the Equator and the tropic of Capricorn had not been very severe. The inhabitants of New Switzerland would soon be able to resume their wonted labours.

After eleven years spent upon this land it was none too soon to attempt to ascertain whether it was a part of one of the continents laved by the Indian Ocean or whether it must be included by geographers among the islands of those seas.

Since the rescue by Fritz of the young English girl upon Burning Rock, M. Zermatt and his wife, his four sons and Jenny Montrose had been happy on the whole. Of course they had at times fears of the future and of the great improbability of deliverance reaching them from outside, and they had, too, memories of home and a longing to get into touch again with mankind.