Chapter THE TENTH (1)

OF THE NAMING OF OUR ISLAND--OF A FLEET OF CANOES, AND OF THE MEANS WHEREBY WE PREPARE TO STAND A SIEGE

We had now fairly established ourselves as the owners of the island, having a comfortable house, domestic animals, and a sufficient store of food, the only article in which we were lamentably deficient being clothes. The necessity we were under of working hard with our hands left us little time for commiseration, and I verily believe that we were in the main as cheerful and happy as we could have been anywhere. And now that the completion of our hardest tasks left us a little leisure, it came into our heads that we ought to give our property a name, or rather it was Billy that thought of it, he saying that since I was clearly king of the country, it was ridiculous not to be able to say what country it was.

"Call it Smoking Island," says he, "because of that old smoker up there."

To this I objected that it was not a pretty name, and besides, the mountain was not always smoking.

"Well then," he said, "call it Lonely Island, because it is lonely, and so are we."

To this I replied that a more cheerful name would suit me better, and suggested that we should call it Perseverance Island, since all our present comforts sprang from our persevering in the face of difficulties. But this Billy would by no means agree to, saying that it looked like bragging, and besides he hated the word perseverance, because he had to write it so many times on his slate at school, and it made him think of raps on the knuckles. He told me that he had been for a few months at a charity school, but he played truant so often that the master refused to have him any longer, at which he was very glad. After considering sundry other names, to which either Billy or I had some objection, we finally settled on Palm Tree Island, both because most of the trees of the island were palms, and because we got our first comfort, when we were deserted, from the cocoa-nut palms on the hill-side.

The general country being thus fitted with a name, we proceeded to name the several parts of it. The mountain we called simply The Mountain, though to Billy it was always Old Smoker; the slope leading up to the crater we called Rocky Hill, and the wood beneath Bread-fruit Wood. The big rock at the north-west corner was Red Rock, and the two smaller ones at the south-west were The Sentinels. And so we named various parts as we thought of it, not all at one time, and many of them not until I made my map, of which I may say more hereafter. I must mention, however, that Billy insisted on giving my name to the wood where we slept on our first night, and in my turn I gave his name to a sandy bay on the west of the island, and Billy was very proud when he spelt out Bobbin's Bay on the aforesaid map.

[Sidenote: Plantations]

So the winter passed away, not like the winter in England, for we had no frost or snow, nor did the leaves fall from the trees; the only true sign that it was winter was the absence of flowers and fruit on the trees; and even this was not the case with all of them, for the cocoa-nut palm bore its fruit all the year round, so that on the same tree there were nuts in all stages of ripeness, which I thought a very wonderful thing. We had a considerable amount of rain, and this became greater as we came into the spring season. We had kept for this season the yams which we saved from the pigs, as I related a while ago, and we now planted them, choosing two places, since we did not know on what soil they would thrive best, whether where we had found them, or near our house. We had kept the yams in one of our pans, and we guessed it was time to plant them because we saw sprouts growing out of them, as you sometimes see the eyes of a potato sprouting. We cut these sprouting parts off, keeping the other parts for boiling, and set them in the ground, some on the ground just below our house, the others in the glade where we had discovered them. Knowing that we stood no chance of getting a crop unless we defended the plants from the wild pigs, we put fences of hurdles (made of twigs and reeds) round our plantations, which were at first only a few yards square, and waited with what patience we might for the result. I will say here that the yams we planted near our house came to nothing, why I know not; but the others throve exceedingly, and though we had some trouble with the pigs, which broke down the fence more than once and did some damage, we got a very fair crop in the summer, which supplied us with mashed potatoes, as Billy said (for which we used dripping from the pigs we cooked), and also with seed for another sowing.

[Sidenote: Articles of Toilet]

Though our great work in the building of our hut was finished (at least we thought it was) our days were by no means idle, for we had our animals to feed and our fences to keep in repair, and moreover we made more pots and pans, also arrows and spears, thread and rope. One thing that gave me much amusement was the brush that Billy made. Of course we had not been able to attend to our toilet since we came to Palm Tree Island, beyond bathing and washing our heads: I mean we could not brush our hair, which was now grown down to our shoulders for want of scissors, nor trim our finger-nails, though our hard work kept these pretty short. But on going down to the lake one sunny day to fetch water I saw my image reflected, and afterwards bemoaning my exceeding unkempt appearance, though in truth it mattered nothing, Billy took it into his head to make me, secretly, a brush and comb, which he presented to me with great glee. "There, old king," says he, for he sometimes called me king instead of master since we named the island, "there you are, and I hope you'll use 'em to keep your old majesty's head tidy." His manner of addressing me was not, you perceive, very reverential; but I will say this for Billy, that though he was very sturdy and independent of spirit, he was never insolent, being a gentleman in his nature, and so we were rather good comrades than anything else, and the talk of kings and so forth was mere fun and play-acting. I did use the brush and comb which he had made for me, but not, I confess, very often, and I cannot help thinking what a great number of things that we are accustomed to we could do without; indeed, though we had made ourselves knives and forks, we did not use them very much either and you might have seen us at dinner-time squat down on the floor of our house, with two mats of leaves in front of us, on one of which was our meat (pork, or a pigeon or fowl), on the other our yams or bread-fruit, boiled or baked, with a little heap of salt in the corner, and little clay mugs filled with cocoa-nut juice or water at the side. Then we would take a yam in one hand and a shank of pork, or a leg of fowl, in the other, dip them in the salt and take a bite, and then a bite of the yam, and so go through our meal very comfortably till only the bones were left. Afterwards we thought of making stools and chairs and a table, as much to employ our time as for any conveniency of them, and then we ate our meals again in the civilized way, though I own I thought it not a whit better nor much cleaner than the other, for we could always wash our hands.

I said that we could not cut our hair, but when it grew so long that it covered our shoulders, and Billy said I should soon be an old woman, we thought of shortening it by burning; so we each became barber in turn, holding the hair away from the head with Billy's comb, and then burning the ends away with a torch. Billy was much more hairy than I was, and though he was three years younger than me his cheeks and chin already showed signs of black whiskers and beard, and one day I found him trying to shave with a flint, having made soap by boiling fat with the ashes of wood; but he succeeded so ill, only making his chin raw, that he gave it up, and said he supposed he would have to look a fright.

[Sidenote: A Fleet of Canoes]

One day, about a year after our first coming to the island, as we judged by the ripeness of the breadfruit, Billy went up Flagstaff Hill, as we called it, to take the survey which we never omitted, each of us doing it in turn, though we sometimes went together. I was moulding a new pan, when all of a sudden I heard a great shout from the hill-side above, and looking up I saw Billy leaping down towards me with a speed that seemed very dangerous, waving his arms and shouting, though in the distance I could not distinguish his words. My heart leapt into my mouth, as the saying is, for from his excitement I surmised that he had descried a sail at sea, and I thought he was calling to me to help him raise our signal. I ran towards him, and as we drew nearer to each other, I saw plainly on his face the marks of great agitation, and then in a breathless way he called the one word "Savages!" and I was instantly in a terrible fear lest they had landed on the island and were coming to attack us.

However, when we met, Billy told me that from the hill-top he had seen a fleet of canoes on the north side of the island, passing from west to east. They were filled with savages, though whether armed or not he could not tell, they being a good distance out at sea, nor was there anything to show whether they purposed landing. It came into my mind with a shock at that moment that we were very ill able to defend ourselves in case they should land and attack us, for we had very little provision in our hut, and if we took refuge there they might keep us shut up until we died of hunger, or thirst, which would be worse. I blamed myself very much for lack of prudence in not making provision for such an emergency, but the truth is that after spending so many months without seeing a human form we had become careless, and went from day to day as though there had been no human beings in the world except our two selves. However, it was too late to make up for this neglect now, if the savages did indeed land, and I saw that in that case we could only take to the woods and trust that our hut and plantations, being inland, might pass undiscovered. Accordingly I accompanied Billy back up the hill, and we went round the wood where our signal-tree was, to a place nearer the crater, whence we had a more extensive view.

"There they are!" cried Billy, pointing out to sea, and I saw eight or nine long canoes filled with brown men, who must have numbered near two hundred in all. But I saw with inexpressible relief that they had come past the Red Rock, and were proceeding steadily eastward, and knowing that there was no beach on the north side of the island where they might land, we had great hope that we should not be troubled with them. Keeping out of sight behind rocks, though indeed there was perhaps little danger of our being seen, we watched the fleet until it became no more than a speck on the eastern horizon, and then we went down to our hut, relieved of present danger, but by no means easy in mind about the future.

[Sidenote: Fortification]

We knew not whether the fleet was going or returning, but whichever it was, I was surprised it had not put in at our island for rest and refreshment, for the nearest land to the west was at least twenty miles away, and on the east it could not be less, for we had seen but the dimmest line in that direction. Billy said the savages were without doubt afraid of the old smoker, and even though he was harmless at present, the island had a bad name, and so they would not land on it except under very great stress. This I devoutly hoped was the true explanation, for if it was, we had a reasonable hope that we should never have to deal with savage enemies. Yet the fright we had had determined us to do something to provide more efficiently for our safety, and the first thing we did was to make loopholes in the walls of our hut, so that if we were at any time forced to take refuge there, we might at least be able to make some resistance by shooting arrows at the enemy. Then we carried a great number of cocoa-nuts into the house, which would provide us both with meat and drink, and we determined to dig a hole in the floor when the bread-fruit was fully ripe, and store it with the pounded pulp as we had done outside. Then it came into my head of a sudden that, our hut being built wholly of logs and thatch, the enemy might easily set fire to it and burn us alive, and to hinder this we carried down great quantities of the clayey soil of which we made our pottery ware, and mixing it with sand and small stones, we made a kind of rough-cast with which we covered the whole of the outside of the hut, roof and all, so that we not only concealed the joints of the walls, but also, as I hoped, protected the hut from fire.

This work took us a long time, as you may guess, and before we had finished it, we saw the fleet again. One or other of us went up the hill several times a day to watch the eastern horizon, and on the third day, I think it was, after we first saw the canoes, a little after sunrise, I saw some tiny specks in the east, and recognizing them by and by for canoes I watched them with great anxiety. I feared lest we might have two enemies to deal with, the savages and the volcano, which had been rumbling for a day or two at intervals, and sending up puffs of steam or smoke, and we wondered whether there was going to be another eruption like that at the time of our first coming. As soon as I saw the canoes, I signalled for Billy to join me, and the moment we caught sight of them he cried: "Why, there's only six; there was eight or nine before," a fact which had escaped my notice. They were plainly heading straight for the island, and not in a course that would bring them past the north side with a good offing as before.

"I don't want to be eat," said Billy, going pale under his sun-tan; "but we can't fight over a hundred savages, can we, master?"

Before I could reply there was a loud rumbling beneath us, and being not a great way from the crater, we set off at a run, going down towards the Red Rock, there being no lava on this side. We had run barely twenty yards when a great puff of steam or smoke was shot up into the air for near two hundred feet, I should guess, and a shower of pumice stones fell around us. This frightened us so much that, forgetting all about the canoes, we did not stop running until we came to the edge of the cliff opposite the Red Rock, and then, there being no more signs of activity in the volcano, we were thinking of climbing up again to our watching-place when, to our great joy, we caught sight of the canoes making round the north side, and indeed bearing away northwards away from us.

"Three cheers for old smoker," cried Billy. "He's scared 'em away, sure as nuts, and they won't eat us after all."

We stood watching the canoes as they made their way very toilsomely against wind and current, and did not go down to our hut until they had quite vanished from sight. It was long past our usual dinner-time, I am sure, and as we had had no breakfast we were mighty hungry, and ate with very good appetites, having lost our fear; and taking up our mugs of cocoa-nut juice, and knocking them together in the way of folks drinking a toast, I cried out, "Here's to old smoker!" and Billy shouted, "God bless him!"

This happened, as I say, three days after our first alarm, and we did not cease from our efforts to put ourselves in a good posture of defence if we should ever again have reason to fear an attack. We had already made our hut fairly fire-proof, and cut loop-holes in the walls, these at varying heights, so that we might shoot down from a height upon the enemy at a distance, or on a level with them if they came to close quarters. Since a man behind walls is equal to at least three outside, I should think, we considered that we two, though hardly come to man's estate, could make a very good fight of it; our only trouble was the matter of water, for while we had no fears in the matter of food, we did not see how by any means we could store sufficient water in the hut, even if we filled all our pots and pans.

[Sidenote: Sinking a Well]

I was lying with Billy one evening outside our hut overlooking the lake, when the solution to this puzzle came all at once into my head. The ground behind the hut sloped pretty steeply down to the lake, the length of the slope being about twenty feet, and the vertical height about six feet--that is, between the floor of our hut and the usual surface of the water. For I must observe here, lest I forget it, that the depth of water in the lake varied very much at different seasons, being far greater after a period of rainy weather than in drought, the variation being at least equal to the height of a man. And in regard to this variation a circumstance caused us much wonderment, for though when the rains were heavy the lake rose very rapidly to a certain point, we observed that it never came higher than that point, no matter how long the rains continued. When I pointed this out to Billy he saw nothing to wonder at in it, saying that the lake must be just like the sea; for though it had rained hundreds and thousands of times since the beginning of the world, the sea had never drowned the world since the Flood, and it surely would have done so unless there was some hole at the bottom that opened when the sea was getting too full.

"That can't be," said I.

"Well, then, how is it?" says he. "You pour water into a cup, and it'll slop over presently. The lake's a cup, though a big one; why don't it slop over after all these rains if there ain't a hole in the bottom, as I say?"

"But it can't be in the bottom, Billy, or the lake would sometimes be drained quite dry," I said.

"Well, it is, pretty nearly," he replied, but I would not admit that, for though the water subsided slowly after the rains had ceased, it had never sunk so low as to let us see the bottom. At low water we hunted all round the lake to see if we could find an outlet through which the water ran away, but we saw none, and remained in our puzzlement for a good while longer.

However, I was beginning to tell of the notion that came into my head as we lay that evening above the lake. Being so little distant from it, I thought, why should we not sink a well in the floor of the hut, and connect it with the lake by a pipe?

"What's the good?" says Billy, when I put the question to him. "For one thing, the water won't run up into the hut without a pump; at least, I've never seen water run uphill yet; and then, as soon as any savages come, you may be sure they'll spy it, and then where are you?"

I said that as for the latter point, we should, of course, take care to show no sign outside of what we had done; and as for the former, I did not despair of finding some way to raise the water to our level, even if we could not make a pump. Billy talked till it was dark about the difficulties of what I proposed--the difficulty of digging a hole, of preventing the earth from falling in, and so forth--until you would have thought he was the poorest-spirited creature that ever lived; but that was only Billy's way, and I often observed that he was never so active and eager, aye, and never so hopeful too, as after he had been talking in this gloomy manner. At any rate, next day he set to work with me to make a trial of my notion.

It happened that, the weather having been dry for a good while, the water was now low, indeed, within a foot of the lowest point to which we had ever known it to sink, which was favourable to our plan; for it was necessary that our pipe should enter the lake below the water's surface, even in the driest weather, and moreover if the latter had been full, we should have found it very troublesome, and perhaps impossible, to do as I shall now relate. This was nothing less than to dam up the water of the lake for a little space, so that we might cut a passage through the side of it towards our hut. To make this dam we felled a number of logs and dragged them down to the bed of the lake, where we arranged them in the shape of a great V, the point of the V being out in the lake, the ends resting on the shore. We lashed the logs together very firmly, and coated them with clay, and so made a dam which we found to answer very well. Of course we had to bale out the water which was first between the arms of the V, and Billy grumbled as we did this, saying that he was sure there would be a heavy rainstorm, and all our work would be for nothing; but in this he turned out a false prophet, since we had no rain at all for many days.

When the inside of the V was dry, its floor was about three feet below the level of the water outside of it; and within that dry space we could work very comfortably at making a cutting through the bank towards the hut. To do this we had to make spades, which we fashioned out of hard wood as well as we could with our axes, and they served our purpose excellently well, though they would not have done so had not the earth been soft; if it had been rocky, I know not what we should have done. With these spades we began to cut away a portion of the sloping bank of the lake, continuing till we had, as it were, taken a slice or a wedge off it, up to within about three yards of our hut. This took us two whole days, for the earth, though soft compared with rock, was pretty compact, and our clumsy tools made us sigh often, and sweat too.

Having come, as I say, to within ten feet or so of our hut, I thought we might then give over digging and endeavour to pierce a way to a point directly beneath the centre of the floor, or at least near enough as that we might sink a shaft to meet it. We surveyed the position for some little while, so as to take our bearings, as Billy said: and then, having got a pretty good notion of the course our proposed passage should take, we shoved into the earth, horizontally, a pole we had sharpened to a point, and when we found we could push it in no further, we drew it out and gave it another mighty shove, directing it in such a way as we thought would bring it midway between the two corner posts, though of course several feet below the floor. We found after a time that, though we tried to drive the pole straight, nevertheless it deflected somewhat towards the right; and when we pulled it out to give it another shove, it met with some obstacle, which I was afraid might be the bottom part of one of our posts, though I could not conceive how we had gone so far out of our reckoning. But with a little more pushing the pole, being in a certain degree flexible, went past the obstacle, so that if this was one of the posts, it had not been met squarely in the middle. The pole being now wholly in the earth except just enough of it to hold by, we judged that we had driven it as far as was needful, and mighty glad of it we were.

Leaving the pole in the earth, we set about boring in the floor of our hut, not beginning midway between the door-posts, as we should have done if we had encountered no obstacle, but a little to one side. We proceeded here in the same manner as we had done in the bank of the lake, using a sharp-pointed pole, only we drove it down in a vertical direction; but we soon found that this would not effect our purpose, as indeed we might have known before if we had thought about it, for it was necessary that we should make a clean hole, which could not be done by driving in a pole. After considering of it, we determined to get a large piece of bamboo stalk, at least five inches across, and to drive that into the earth with the pummet we had used in building the hut. This we did, and placing the bamboo (a piece about three feet long) in the hole we had already begun to drive, we dealt it several heavy blows with the pummet, by this means driving it into the ground, and at the same time forcing some earth up into its hollow interior. Then we took the bamboo out, and carrying it outside the hut, poked all the earth out of it, and when it was empty, put it once more into the hole, and smote it again as before. This was a very tedious business, for as the hole went deeper we had to use a longer piece of bamboo, and when we had near finished the bamboo broke in the middle, and we had to dig to a depth of three feet or more around the hole before we could reach the lower portion to pull it out again, at which Billy was very wroth, because the excavation had to be filled in again, so as to bring the floor to its former level. However, we continued until the hole was seven or eight feet deep, at which depth we thought we should come to the pole we had driven through the bank; but it would have been scarcely less than a miracle if we had bored the hole to the exact spot, and we had indeed to enlarge its circumference until it measured full thirty inches across, and not till then did we come to the pole. When we did strike this we were both very joyful, for we had been working at it for four full days, and had yet got but a very little way in our design.

[Sidenote: A Surprising Discovery]

We went back now to the lake-side, and using bamboos as we had done in the hut, but with longer and larger stems, we made little by little a sort of tunnel about five inches wide running to the well we had sunk. We then sank this latter a few inches below its former level, so as to make a kind of cistern or reservoir for the water when it should flow in from the lake; and in order that the water might not run away through the soft earth, we let down a quantity of clay with which to line the bottom, intending to bake it with fire after we had rammed it until it became hard and tight. Billy took this work of ramming, performing it with a long and stout pole, which he lifted high and then brought down with great force, he always delighting to show the strength of his muscles. However, he had just made a stroke of particular power, when the beater pole slipped from his hands and he fell flat on his face over the top of the well. He was on his feet again in an amazing short time, and I laughed as he ran to the door, holding his nose, I thinking he was running to the lake to bathe it. But in a moment I was aware of a very evil smell which came without a doubt from the well we had sunk, and it was so powerful, and also noisome, that I very quickly beat a retreat too, and joined Billy outside the hut.

"I'm poisoned," says Billy, spluttering and spitting on the ground. "What did you do it for, master? I said as how 'twould be no use."

"You're a Job's comforter," said I, somewhat tartly, such a speech as Billy's only sharpening the edge of adversity, to my thinking.

"You're another," says Billy, who did not in the least know what I meant, his acquaintance with the Bible being at that time, I fear, very slight. "There's the bottom knocked out of the well, and dead men's bones below, that's what it is."

It did come into my head for a minute that we might have opened up some grave, or at least a place where human folk had been overtaken and buried by lava from the mountain; but I soon gave this up, for the earth was soft, and not a whit like lava, and as for a grave, no one would have dug it so deep down in the earth. I was just as much vexed as Billy was at this untoward event, but I think I was even more curious to learn what was beneath our unlucky well, and I went back soon into the hut, intending to examine the place. However, the evil smell was so overpowering that I was fain to seek the open air again, and it was some time, an hour or two, maybe, before the air became clear enough for us to enter the hut with any comfort. Bethinking myself that the clearing of the air showed that there might be nothing very terrible below, the foul smell being due to the sudden release of air long imprisoned, I got a length of our rope, and let it down with a stone on the end until it touched the bottom, which we found to be twice as deep as before; and when I did this, I perceived another thing which seemed to me mighty strange, which was nothing less than a current of air passing up through the well. There was, it is true, a passage now between the lake-side and the hut, but we had felt no current when the connection was first established, and yet we could not conceive of a current coming from the very bowels of the earth. Billy declared, in something of a fright, that we had got down to the roots of the mountain, whence came the steam and the hot water; but I answered that this was plainly absurd, the current of air that we felt being perfectly cool, though not very fresh.

I thought we might let down a torch into the well, whereby we should perhaps be able to see something of what was below. Accordingly we kindled a torch of kernels and let it down at the end of a rope, and very evilly it smelled, I assure you. We observed that the flame flickered a great deal until it descended to the first bottom of our well, or perhaps two or three feet deeper; then the torch burnt more steadily, but the flame did not rise straight up, but seemed to be swayed a little to either side, and I could not help thinking, by the look of it, that it was burning in a greater space than when it was in our narrow well-shaft. Considering of some means of proving whether this was so or not, I could at first see none, short of enlarging the shaft until one of us could descend it, which indeed neither Billy nor I was disposed to attempt. It was next day when an idea came into my head, and that was occasioned by my seeing the spring-back of Billy's bow when he shot at the running man, at which we exercised ourselves now and again, seeing that we might have real men to shoot at some day. The spring of the bow, I say, gave me a notion, and taking a flexible strip of wood of the same tree, I tied one end of it to a long pole, and then bent it double, not fastening it in that position, but inserting it thus bent into the shaft, the sides of which prevented it from springing back. Then I lowered the pole, and the bent piece of wood scraped the sides of the well until it reached what had been the bottom and a little beyond it; but then, as I still let down the pole, the bent wood sprang loose, like as Billy's bow did, which showed very plainly that the shaft was much wider below.

This discovery perplexed, nay, disquieted us. For one thing, it was a mercy that we had not lighted on this hollow chamber, for such it must be, when we were driving in the posts for our hut, for then we might have broken our necks. As yet we were ignorant of the extent of this open space, though we knew its depth, nor could we tell whether it in any way endangered the firmness of the hut. Billy said that if he had known there was such a cellar beneath us he would not have lifted a hand to help me build, and I own that if we had discovered it when we were beginning to build, I should have assuredly chosen another situation. But after spending so many months of hard work in putting up our hut, I was very loath to leave it now and begin all over again, though it was a staggering thought that at any moment of the day or night we might sink, and the hut too, and maybe be cast into another hole, for we could not tell but that the second bottom might give way like the first. Moreover, even supposing that our hut was no less safe than before, all the labour that we had been put to in devising a means of supplying ourselves with water from the lake had gone for nought. I think this was the heaviest blow we had had since we took up our abode on the island, and for a time we stood stock-still, contemplating the dark hole that was the grave, so to speak, of our hopes.

CHAPTER THE ELEVENTH

OF OUR SUBTERRANEOUS ADVENTURE, AND THE MANNER IN WHICH THE WILD DOGS PROFITED BY OUR ABSENCE

"Billy," said I, after we had stood silent a good while, "we must find out what is below."

"What's the good?" says Billy; "and how can you do it? Neither of us can scrooge ourselves down through this hole, and I ain't a-going to try, that's certain."

"But you can help to make the hole wider," I replied.

"And suppose I fall in," says he, "who'll pull me out?"

"I should certainly do my best," said I.

"And suppose you fall in too?" says he, being very persistent.

"Then we shall help each other out," said I.

"And suppose we find ourselves in the old smoker's kitchen, or get buried alive or something?" says Billy.

"We won't suppose any more, but just set to work," said I. "I will dig out the earth, and you can carry it away, and then there'll be no chance of your tumbling in."

The matter being put thus, Billy would by no means agree to it, but insisted that he would take his turn with me at digging. He asked me, however, how the earth was to be carried away, for if we did it with our hands it would take a month of Sundays. I answered that we must certainly make some baskets, which was a pretty easy matter after a little practice, there being plenty of rushes and such-like things growing at the borders of the lake. Having made two very fair baskets, that would hold about a bushel apiece, we began with our spades to cut away the earth around the hole, Billy carrying it outside the hut when I dug, and I doing the same when he dug. This work was exceeding laborious, since when digging we had to be very careful not to let the earth fall down the shaft and choke it up, and also the basketfuls of earth had to be hauled up every few minutes. We were several days at the work before we came to the bamboo pipe we had driven in from the lake side--not, of course, that we did nothing else, having our other duties to attend to, and besides we now went up to our watch-tower three times, and sometimes four, every day, so that the savages should not come in their canoes and take us by surprise.

[Sidenote: The Cavern]

Having got down to the pipe, which, as I have said, was but a few inches above the cavity into which we had broken, we saw that we must be even more careful, for if the earth should give way all of a sudden, as it did before, we might for all we knew be hurled into a bottomless abyss. All the time we had been digging we had felt the current of cool air striking upward against us, from which it was plain that the chamber below was not a perfectly closed vault, and the only comfort we had of this was that we were certainly not coming to the old smoker's kitchen, as Billy called it, for then the air would have been hot. To avoid this headlong fall, I considered we should now cease to stand on the ledge of earth at the side of the hole, and rig up a rope ladder which we might attach securely to the doorposts above. Billy was digging when this idea came into my head, he being lighter than I, and after I told him of it he scrambled up very quickly by means of steps we had cut in the side, confessing he was glad to get out in safety.

It took us some time to make a rope ladder, but when it was done, and fastened to the doorposts, I descended and hacked away with my spade at the sides of the hole below me until I had made it big enough for my body to go through. Then I got Billy to hand down to me a lighted torch, and bending as low as I could, I clung to the ladder with one hand, and with the other held the torch in the space below, being nearly suffocated by its stinking fumes. However, by moving the torch backwards and forwards I made out that the space was a small chamber, oblong in shape, but not regular, and with a floor, but, so far as I could see, no outlet, though I knew there must be one, because of the current of air. Feeling by no means sure of the depth of the floor below me, I clambered up again and pulled the ladder after me, and we lengthened it by some three feet before I descended again. By the light of my torch I then saw that I could drop to the floor without any danger, and I let go the ladder, and fell upon my feet on hard rock.

"What cheer, master?" calls out Billy, with his face close to the top of the shaft above. I told him that I was safe and what manner of place I was in, and said I would explore further, and when I did so I found that we had no need to trouble ourselves about the safety of our hut, because the walls of this underground chamber were of hard rock, like the rocks on the sides of the mountain, and the roof the same, except at the place where we had dug our shaft. How this came to be I did not trouble to think,[1] nor did it concern us, the great matter for us being that our hut had a solid foundation, which was a great comfort. When I told this to Billy, by shouting up through the shaft, the sound of my voice echoing very strangely, he cried back that he was glad to hear it and that he was coming down to see. "No, no," I cried at this; "you keep guard above while I seek further; and besides, the ladder does not reach the ground, and perhaps you couldn't get up again."

"Then how will you get up, master?" says Billy.

"Why, you can draw the ladder up while I go exploring, and by the time I come back you can lengthen it," was my answer.

This he agreed to do, only he begged me not to be long.

[Sidenote: A Tunnel]

When I came to examine the chamber, I found it to be neither so large nor so lofty as I had first supposed. The general height of it was not above five feet, though in parts it rose to ten feet or more. I had soon made a tour about the chamber, the compass of which was perhaps sixty or seventy feet, and in one corner of it I at last discovered an opening, through which, I did not doubt, came the current of air I have before mentioned. It was, as I found when I held my torch to it, a very low and narrow passage, not above four feet high, and the draught of air was so strong that it made my torch flare, and, indeed, was like to blow it out. This made me consider whether I had not better rest content and go no further; but curiosity was strong within me, and so I went into the passage, or tunnel, having to bend my body very low, and crept along with great caution, holding the torch in front of me lest I came unawares upon a chasm and broke my neck. The passage seemed to me to incline slightly downward, though I could not be sure of this, since there were not only several crooks and turns in it, so that not many yards of it were straight, but also it was in some parts pretty near choked with rocks and stones, which I supposed had fallen from the roof and sides. However, I picked my way among these obstacles when they occurred, and found as I went on that the passage became both wider and loftier, so that I was able to stand upright.

After I had gone some distance through this tunnel, wondering whether it was natural or had been made by men's hands, and inclining to the former belief, I perceived that it was joined by another passage which ran into it from my right hand, and the two passages thus joined in one became a tunnel which increased both in width and height the further I went. Whereas at starting from the cavern I had had to bend low, with little space on either side of me, I now found myself in a passage which in some parts was as much as twenty feet high, as near as I could guess in the deceitful light of my torch, and so wide that five or six men could easily have walked abreast in it. And as I still kept my eyes cast down, being heedful of my footing, I perceived by and by on the floor of the passage sundry small whitish objects which, when I stooped to examine them, I found to be shells, and they became more numerous the further I went. I began now to question with myself whether this tunnel did not communicate with the sea, and whether the sea ever came up through it so far into the interior of the island, for the cavern whence I had started on this journey was directly below our hut, and that was situate at least half a mile from the sea-shore.

I went on, being eager to satisfy myself on this point, and holding my torch about the level of my head, when all at once I felt the skin of my hand scorched, and, looking up, saw that the flame was burning very low, which had escaped me, so much were my thoughts taken up. I had no mind to pursue this journey in darkness, for though I had come very well to this point, I knew not whereto the tunnel would bring me, nor what perils might be lurking in the way. Accordingly I turned myself about, purposing to acquaint Billy with what I had discovered, and to come again, either with him or alone, with sufficient light to hold out to the end. But I soon saw, to my exceeding discomfort, that I had already presumed too much upon the endurance of my torch, which was flickering lower and lower, and within a little, though I made what haste I could, went out altogether. At this I was mightily vexed, though not alarmed, for the floor of the tunnel was perfectly sound, albeit rough, and I did not look for the least difficulty in making my way back to the cavern. Though not alarmed, I say, I was vexed, for I could not go nearly so fast in the dark, and I began to think that Billy might be a little uneasy at my long absence. As to myself, there was only one thing to trouble about, and that was to keep to the right hand, so that I should not fail of re-entering the passage by which I had come when I arrived at the place where the other passage joined with it. To make sure on this point I felt with my hand along the wall at my right, and found this a help to me for some distance; but by and by I had to leave it, so as to get past some rocks that stood in my way, and in a little while after I returned to it I stumbled clean over another obstacle, hurting my hands and knees, though luckily my head did not strike the ground.

[Sidenote: Lost]

When I rose up, I could not find the wall at once, the passage here being exceedingly rough with loose rocks and stones. I stumbled on, and now for the first time the thought came into my head, how awful it would be if a man were lost in such an underground passage as this, not at first thinking of this plight as likely to be mine, though soon I did begin to be very uneasy, and indeed I was almost overcome with horror when all of a sudden I thought, "What if there be a perfect network of these passages in the island, and I can never light on the cavern again?" I wished now very heartily that I had let Billy come down to me when he offered it, but there was no use in wishing, so I groped my way onward, having now got my hand upon the wall again.

I had noticed for some time that the floor of the tunnel was ascending, and it seemed to me steeper than I had thought it to be when I came the other way; but I paid little heed to this, because a hill always seems steeper when you ascend than when you descend. But all of a sudden I felt that the inclination was downward, and I was trying to recollect if I had gone up and then down as I came from the cavern, when I felt something cold about my feet, and, taking a step forward, splashed in water. Instantly I turned about and rushed back, stumbling and falling, and in a great dismay, for I knew now that I had lost my bearings. There had been no water in the passage when I came; either water had rushed into it suddenly, though how that could be I knew not, or else I had come into another passage. Whichever it might be, my situation was exceeding serious, for I might be drowned, or I might wander for hours and never come to the cavern. I picked myself up when I fell in my haste, and as I leant against the wall to recover myself, something scurried past my feet, which made me shiver until I thought that it could not be more than a rat or some other small beast. But being now so confused that I knew not whether I had come from right or left, I lifted up my voice and shouted the seaman's call "Ahoy!" for if I was anywhere near the cavern, Billy might hear me, and that familiar word would bring him, I did not doubt, to my help. I was startled by what ensued upon my shout, for the whole space about me was filled with noise, which at first I did not know to be the reverberation of my own voice. The noise, the like of which I suppose had never been heard in that place before, terrified all the denizens of it, and I felt several small animals brush against my legs as they scurried past. When the sounds had rolled away, I listened very intently for some answering cry, but there was none, even though I shouted again, and I could not but conclude that the din, great as it was, had failed to reach Billy's ears. And since it now seemed plain that I must depend on myself alone, and to stay still where I was would not help me a jot, I began in sheer desperation to grope my way along the passage, not knowing in the least whether I was going right or wrong. But supposing that I had overshot the entrance to the passage leading back to the cavern, and that I was now retracing my steps, I crept along by the wall on my left hand, every now and again stopping to shout and listen, but always in vain. And it came into my mind presently that while the sound of my voice might carry a good way along the portion of the tunnel in which I then was, yet it would not penetrate far along the passage that ran back at a very sharp angle from it, so that I would do better to save my breath until I arrived at the fork, and I went on again, holding my peace.