Some evenings, when Ato was trying out new recipes in the galley, Tandy and Samuel would descend to the hold to look over the plants from Patrippany Island, try to figure out the script on the piece of lava, and sort and arrange Samuel's shell collection. Every day after the nets were drawn up there were new specimens to classify and label. The drawing Tandy had made of the Sea Lion and all the pictures of the Leopard Men and beasts on Patrippany Island, Samuel had framed and hung above his shelves so that the hold was looking more and more like a scientific laboratory every day.
"Do you suppose we'll ever find anything large enough to put in those big cages and aquariums?" asked Tandy one night as he pasted a pink label on a fluted conch shell.
"Sure's eight bells!" murmured Samuel Salt comfortably. "No telling what'll turn up on a voyage like this. Personally I've set my heart on a roc's egg, but setting the heart on a roc's egg won't hatch one out, Ho, Ho! No, No! But, on the other hand, one never can tell and we've had a week of such fine and pleasant days, I look for something to happen any moment now, so you'd better put up your paste pot and turn in, my lad, so we'll all be ready for the morning."
"Well, what would you do with a roc's egg?" inquired Tandy, reluctantly clapping the top on his bottle of glue. "Aren't they terribly big and terribly scarce, Captain Salt?"
"Terribly!" admitted Samuel Salt, placing his tray of lamp shells back on their stand. "But a newly laid roc's egg is as rare as a mermaid's foot, and no larger than one small tar barrel. Now if we could just get a newly laid roc's egg aboard and find some way to preserve it, why, well and good, if we didn't find a way and it hatched before we landed, it could easily fly off with us and the ship, for THAT'S how big a bird a roc is. But I'll take a chance if I ever find a roc's egg and there's an island somewhere in these waters where rocs are known to nest. Rock Island it's called, and a roc's nest would be something to see, eh, Kinglet?"
"Please don't call me that," begged Tandy earnestly. "Roger says I don't have to be a King on this ship and I like not being a King."
"Ha! Ha! And I like you that way myself," roared Samuel, tossing Tandy suddenly to his shoulder. "Why, since you've stopped this King and son of a Kinging, you're a seaman after my own heart, and so long as the Crescent Moon's afloat you've a berth on her! Up with you! Up with you! Tomorrow's another day." Swinging gaily to the main deck, Samuel tumbled Tandy into his bunk and went striding aft to take in his main and mizzen topsails.
Next morning, while he and Ato were cutting up potatoes for Nikobo, Tandy was not surprised to hear a loud hail from above. Something had happened just as Samuel had predicted. Running out with a paring knife still in his hand, he saw a strange glittering mountainous island abaft the beam. It was still a goodish sea mile away, but with the glasses Ato generously pressed upon him Tandy made out the most curious bit of geography the eyes of a voyager had yet gazed on. There was not a piece of level ground on the island anywhere. Its high, glittering, needle-like peaks rose straight out of the sea with apparently no way of ascending or descending. Of clear crystal, reflecting every color of the rainbow, the beautiful island was almost too dazzling to look at as it lay shimmering and sparkling in the bright sunshine. As they sailed nearer, Tandy saw that a perfect maze of high and airy bridges ran like a gigantic spider web between the peaks. On these bridges all the island's life and activities seemed to take place. Quaint fluted cottages were built in the center, and along the perilous catwalks on either side raced the Mountaineers themselves, brandishing glittering poles and spears and halberds.
"Pikes on the peak! Pikes on the peak! Port your helm, Sammy," roared Ato. "Not too close! Not too near, Sam-u-el. How'd you like to be pinned to the mast with a spear or flattened on the deck with a boulder?"