After feeling about for some time—for our legs were unshackled, although our wrists were still bound with thongs—we found a low ledge of rock running along one side of the cavern. On this we seated ourselves, and for a long time maintained unbroken silence.
At last I could restrain my feelings no longer. “Alas! dear Jack and Peterkin,” said I, “what is to become of us? I fear that we are doomed to die.”
“I know not,” replied Jack, in a tremulous voice, “I know not; Ralph, I regret deeply the hastiness of my violent temper, which, I must confess, has been the chief cause of our being brought to this sad condition. Perhaps the teacher may do something for us. But I have little hope.”
“Ah! no,” said Peterkin, with a heavy sigh; “I am sure he can’t help us. Tararo doesn’t care more for him than for one of his dogs.”
“Truly,” said I, “there seems no chance of deliverance, unless the Almighty puts forth his arm to save us. Yet I must say that I have great hope, my comrades, for we have come to this dark place by no fault of ours—unless it be a fault to try to succour a woman in distress.”
I was interrupted in my remarks by a noise at the entrance to the cavern, which was caused by the removal of the barricade. Immediately after, three men entered, and, taking us by the collars of our coats, led us away through the forest. As we advanced, we heard much shouting and beating of native drums in the village, and at first we thought that our guards were conducting us to the hut of Tararo again. But in this we were mistaken. The beating of drums gradually increased, and soon after we observed a procession of the natives coming towards us. At the head of this procession we were placed, and then we all advanced together towards the temple where human victims were wont to be sacrificed!
A thrill of horror ran through my heart as I recalled to mind the awful scenes that I had before witnessed at that dreadful spot. But deliverance came suddenly from a quarter whence we little expected it. During the whole of that day there had been an unusual degree of heat in the atmosphere, and the sky assumed that lurid aspect which portends a thunder-storm. Just as we were approaching the horrid temple, a growl of thunder burst overhead and heavy drops of rain began to fall.
Those who have not witnessed gales and storms in tropical regions can form but a faint conception of the fearful hurricane that burst upon the island of Mango at this time. Before we reached the temple, the storm burst upon us with a deafening roar, and the natives, who knew too well the devastation that was to follow, fled right and left through the woods in order to save their property, leaving us alone in the midst of the howling storm. The trees around us bent before the blast like willows, and we were about to flee in order to seek shelter, when the teacher ran toward us with a knife in his hand.
“Thank the Lord,” he said, cutting our bonds, “I am in time! Now, seek the shelter of the nearest rock.”
This we did without a moment’s hesitation, for the whistling wind burst, ever and anon, like thunder-claps among the trees, and, tearing them from their roots, hurled them with violence to the ground. Rain cut across the land in sheets, and lightning played like forked serpents in the air; while, high above the roar of the hissing tempest, the thunder crashed, and burst, and rolled in awful majesty.