TREASURE ISLAND
Jim Hawkins, the boy hero of Stevenson’s tale, had sailed with a party of adventuresome gentlemen on the ship Hispaniola, to find the pirate gold which, as they had private proof, lay buried on Treasure Island. Unfortunately, the crew was largely composed of ruffians, who had themselves been pirates, and who also knew of the buried treasure. On reaching the island, these fellows mutinied and tried to kill brave Captain Smollett and the party of gold-seekers. As their only means of safety the latter went ashore and entrenched themselves in a stockade which former visitors had built there; while the Hispaniola, anchored in the harbor, fell into the hands of the pirates, who promptly hoisted the black flag. One foggy night Jim, who was an adventurous and inquisitive lad, secretly stole out from the stockade and found hidden in a cove a tiny home-made boat, clumsy and queer. This boat was “buoyant and clever in a sea-way, but the most cross-grained, lopsided craft to manage. Turning round and round was the manœuvre she was best at.” However, he managed to paddle out to the Hispaniola, intending to cut her moorings. With some difficulty he accomplished this design, but immediately a change of wind and current seized both ship and coracle, and sent them spinning out through the narrows towards open sea. Expecting to be dashed in pieces on some bar or in the raging breakers, Jim lay down helpless, and overcome by weariness and anxiety fell asleep. “The Cruise of the Coracle” begins at this point.
THE CRUISE OF THE CORACLE
(From Treasure Island.)
By ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.
It was broad day when I awoke, and found myself tossing at the southwest end of Treasure Island. The sun was up, but was still hid from me behind the great bulk of the Spy-glass, which on this side descended almost to the sea in formidable cliffs. Haulbowline Head and Mizzenmast Hill were at my elbow; the hill bare and dark, the head bound with cliffs forty or fifty feet high, and fringed with great masses of fallen rock. I was scarce a quarter of a mile to seaward, and it was my first thought to paddle in and land.
That notion was soon given over. Among the fallen rocks the breakers spouted and bellowed; loud reverberations, heavy sprays flying and falling, succeeded one another from second to second; and I saw myself, if I ventured nearer, dashed to death upon the rough shore, or spending my strength in vain to scale the beetling crags.
Nor was that all; for crawling together on flat tables of rock, or letting themselves drop into the sea with loud reports, I beheld huge slimy monsters—soft snails, as it were, of incredible bigness—two or three score of them together, making the rocks to echo with their barkings.