The Lonely Island: The Refuge of the Mutineers. Robert Michael Ballantyne
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until it curled over and rushed with a mighty roar and a snowy crest towards the beach. There it dashed itself in tumultuous foam among the rocks.
“Give way, lads,” said Christian, sitting down after a prolonged gaze at this scene; “we may find a better spot farther on.”
As they proceeded they were received with wild and plaintive cries by innumerable sea-birds, whose homes were on the cliffs, and who evidently resented this intrusion of strangers.
“Shall we give ’em a shot, sir?” asked McCoy, laying his hand on a musket.
“No, time enough for that,” replied Christian, shortly.
They pulled right round the island without seeing a single spot more available for a landing than the place they had first approached.
It was a very little bay, with a small clump of six cocoa-nut trees near the water’s edge on the right, and a single cocoa-nut tree on the left, about two hundred yards from the others. Above these, on a hill a little to the westward, there was a grove of the same species.
“We’ll have to try it, sir,” said John Adams, looking at his leader inquiringly.
“We’re sure to capsize,” observed McCoy.
“No matter,” said Christian; “we have at last reached home, and I’m bound not to be baffled at the door. Come, Ohoo, you know something about beaching canoes in a surf; there can’t be much difference with a boat. Get up in the bow and direct me how to steer.”
He spoke to one of the native in the imperfect jumble of Otaheitan and English with which the white men had learned to communicate with the natives. Ohoo understood, and at once went to the bow of the boat, the head of which was now directed towards a place in the cliffs where there seemed to be a small bay or creek. The native gave directions with his arms right or left, and did not require to speak. Christian steered with one of the oars instead of the rudder, to give him more power over the boat.
Soon they began to feel the influence of the in-going wave. It was a moment of intense anxiety. Christian ordered the men to cease rowing. Ohoo made a sudden and violent indication with his left arm. Christian obeyed.
“Give a gentle pull, boys,” he said.
They rose as he spoke on the top of a wave so high that they could look down for a moment on the seething foam that raged between them and the beach, and Christian was about to order the men to pull hard, when the native looked back and shook his head excitedly. They had not got sufficiently into the grasp of that wave; they must wait for the next.
“Back all!” shouted the steersman. The boat slid back into the trough of the sea, while the wave went roaring inward.
The succeeding wave was soon close astern. It seemed to curl over them, threatening destruction, but it lifted them, instead, on its high shoulders. There was a slight appearance of boiling on the surface of the moving billow as it caught them. It was about to break, and the boat was fairly in its grasp.
“Give way!” shouted Christian, in a sharp, loud voice.
A moment more, and they were rushing grandly in on a mountain of snow, with black rocks rising on either side. It was nervous work. A little to the right or a little to the left, and their frail bark would have been dashed to pieces. As it was, they were launched upon a strip of sand and gravel that lay at the foot of the towering cliffs.
“Hurrah!” cried Martin and Brown, in wild excitement, as they leaped over the bow after the natives, while Christian, Adams, Quintal, and McCoy went over the stern to prevent the boat being dragged back by the recoiling foam, and pushed it high and dry on the beach.
“Well done! Here we are at last in Bounty Bay!” exclaimed Christian, with a look of satisfaction, giving to the spot, for the first time, that name which it ever afterwards retained. “Make fast the painter—there; get your arms now, boys, and follow me.”
At the head of the bay there was a hill, almost a cliff, up which there wound something that had the appearance of a path, or the almost dry bed of a water-course. It was exceedingly steep, but seemed the only route by which the interior of the island could be reached. Up the tangled pass for about three hundred yards the explorers advanced in single file, all except Quintal, who was left in charge of the boat.
“It looks very like a path that has been made by men,” said Christian, pausing to breathe, and turning round when half-way up the height; “don’t you think so, Brown?”
Thus appealed to, the botanist, whose eyes had been enchained by the luxuriant and lovely herbage of the place, stooped to inspect the path.
“It does look a little like it, sir,” he replied, with some caution, “but it also looks not unlike a water-course. You see it is a little wet just hereabouts. Isn’t it? What think you, Isaac Martin?”
“I don’t think nothin’ about it,” returned Martin, solemnly, turning over the quid of tobacco that bulged his cheek; “but if I might ventur’ for to give an opinion, I should say it don’t much matter what it is, one way or another.”
“That’s true, Isaac,” said Christian, with a short laugh, as he resumed his march up the cliff.
On the way they were shaded and kept pleasantly cool by the neighbouring precipices but on gaining the top they came into a blaze of sunshine, and then became suddenly aware that they had discovered a perfect paradise. They stood on a table-land which was thickly covered with cocoa-nut trees. A quarter of a mile farther on lay a beautiful valley, the slopes and mounds of which were clothed with trees and beautiful flowering herbage of various kinds, in clumps and groves of picturesque form, with open glades and little meadows between, the whole being backed by a grand mountain-range which traversed the island, and rose to a height of more than a thousand feet.
“It is heaven upon earth!” exclaimed Brown, as they began to push into the heart of the lovely scene.
“Humph! It’s not all gold that glitters,” growled McCoy, with a sarcastic smile.
“It’s pretty real, nevertheless,” observed Isaac Martin; “I only hope there ain’t none o’ the rascally niggers livin’ here.”
Christian said nothing, but wandered on, looking about him like one in a dream.
Besides cocoa-nut palms and other trees and shrubs, there were banyan-trees, the branches of which dropped downwards to the earth and there took root, and other large timber-trees, and plantains, bananas, yams, taro-roots, mulberry, tee-plant, and other fruit-bearing plants in great profusion. Over this richly varied scene the eyes of William Brown wandered in rapture.
“Magnificent!” he exclaimed; “a perfect garden!”
“Rich enough soil, eh?” said Martin, turning some of it up with the point of his shoe.
“Rich enough, ay; couldn’t be finer,” said Brown. “I should think, from its deep red colour, that it is chiefly decomposed lava. The island is evidently volcanic in its origin. I hope we shall find fresh water. We’ve not seen much yet, but it’s sure to be found somewhere, for such magnificent vegetation could not exist without it.”
“What have we here?” said Christian, stooping to pick up something. “A stone implement of some kind, like a spear-head, I think. It seems to me that the island must have been inhabited once, although it does not appear to be so now.”
After they had wandered about for some time, examining the land, and passing many a commentary, both grave and humorous, they turned to retrace their steps, when Brown, who had gone on in advance, was heard to cheer as he waved his hat above his head. He had discovered a spring. They all hastened towards the spot. It lay like a clear gem in the hollow of a rock a considerable distance up the mountain. It was unanimously named “Brown’s Pool,” but it did not contain much water at the time.
“Can we do better than dine here?” said Isaac Martin. “There’s lots o’ food around us.”
This was true, for of the various fruits which grew wild in the island, the cocoa-nut, plantain, and banana were to be had all the year round.
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