"Let us say in the goose family, to save any dispute," M. Zermatt answered; "and goose is the best name for these stupid birds."
"Perhaps that is why they are sometimes mistaken for men," Jack suggested slyly.
"Wag!" Hannah exclaimed.
"Only from a distance," M. Zermatt added. "And really, just look at their necks with a ring of white feathers, their small wings hanging down like two little arms, their upright heads, their black feet, and the regular lines in which they are drawn up! They look like a regiment of soldiers in uniform. Do you remember, boys, what a number of penguins there used to be on the rocks at the mouth of Jackal River?"
"Rather!" said Ernest; "I can still see Jack rushing into the midst of the foe, with water up to his waist, and hitting out so stoutly that he knocked over half-a-dozen of the penguins with his stick!"
"Exactly," Jack acknowledged. "And as I was only ten years old at the time didn't I show promise?"
"You have fulfilled the promise, too," added M. Zermatt with a smile. "The poor creatures that we ill treated thus evidently made haste to abandon the beach at Deliverance Bay, and came to take refuge on this coast."
Whether this was so or not, it was the fact that the auks or penguins had absolutely deserted the shores of the bay within the first few months after the settlement at Rock Castle.
Continuing on her way along the line of coast, the Elizabeth passed by wide stretches where at low water vast sheets of salt deposit must be left high and dry. There must have been enough to employ a hundred hands salt-raking, and the future colony would be able to collect there all the salt it could possibly require.
From the foot of the cliff, which ended here in a sharp angle, a promontory ran out beneath the water. The pinnace was obliged to sheer off more than a mile to sea. When she again put in towards the coast, it was to make for the creek where the valley debouched which had been seen from the heights above Unicorn Bay.