Chapter Twenty Nine.Fritz goes Hunting.After his last remark, Eric, silent for a little while, as if buried in deep thought, followed behind his brother to the garden patch, which was found in the most flourishing state.The potatoes were all in full flower and the haulms of sturdy growth promised well for the crop of tubers beneath, some indeed being already half withered, as if fit for digging; while pods were thick on the two rows of peas planted, and the scarlet runners were a mass of bloom and brilliancy.At such a glorious sight, Eric could remain silent no longer.“This is capital,” he exclaimed in high delight; “why, we’ve got a regular harvest, brother!”“Yes, the great Mother Earth has rewarded our exertions,” said Fritz thoughtfully. “It is wonderful how she yields to those who cultivate her properly! I can see that we’ll have bushels of potatoes—enough to last us through the winter.”“Aye, and peas and beans, too,” chorussed Eric. “Look, here, at this lot, Fritz! I believe we can have a dish of them to-day.”“What, to keep up the festival with?” said his brother, smiling. “I see you are still thinking of that; but, methinks, green peas at Christmas will be rather an anachronism!”“Hang the what-do-you-call-it—oh, anachronism!” cried the lad impulsively. “When we’re at Rome we must do as Rome does.”“I don’t remember, though, that the citizens of ‘The city on the seven hills’ ate peas in December, as far as my reading of the classics go,” remarked Fritz ironically.He liked to “pick up” his brother sometimes in fun.“Ah, that was because they were pagans, and didn’t keep up our Christmas ceremonies!” cried Eric triumphantly. “Still, Romans or no Romans, I declare we’ll have a rare banquet to-day, brother, eh!”“No roast beef, I hope!”“Oh no, bother it—something better than that! You just let me alone and you’ll see bye-and-bye!”“All right, laddie, I don’t mind leaving the cooking in your hands, now,” said Fritz kindly, wishing to blot out the recollection of his last remark. “You have had experience since your first memorable attempt, which I must say was perhaps excusable under the circumstances.”“You are a brick, old fellow,” responded Eric, much pleased at this speech. “Only trust matters to my hands and, I promise you I’ll not let you have any opportunity to find fault with me a second time!”“Very good; that’s agreed,” said Fritz; and, after thus settling matters, the two then went about the garden, gathering its produce—the elder digging up some new potatoes for trial, while Eric picked all the early peas that seemed fit, quite filling a good-sized basket which he had brought with him; although Fritz, who had not been so thoughtful, had to put his potatoes in a handkerchief.On their way home, the brothers passed through the deserted penguin rookery, with never a bark or a grumble from the whilom excited birds as they tramped the well-worn paths which they had made from the thicket to the beach.The inhabitants of the feathered colony were now educating their little ones in the art of fishing; and, the scene in front of the bay was quite enlivening as the birds swam about gracefully in curves, losing in the sea that ungainliness and ugly, awkward appearance which seemed inseparable from them on land, and prosecuting their task, without any of the noise that had distinguished them while breeding.Birds were darting about—here, there, and everywhere in the water; some, swimming after each other as if in a race, like a shoal of fish; others, again, chasing one another on the surface, on which they seemed to run, using the ends of their wings, or flappers, to propel them like oars, for they dipped in the tips of their pinions and scattered the spray in their progress. To add to the charm, the calm expanse of sea reflected the pure ultramarine blue of the sky above, being illumined at the same time by the bright sunlight, which brought out in strong relief the twin headlands embracing the little bay with their outstretching arms.Nothing, indeed, could be more unlike the crusoes’ old associations of Christmas and Christmas-tide than this prospect presented, nothing less suggestive of: home; and yet, standing there, on the shore of their lonely sea-girt and cliff-embattled island home, gazing across the ocean that spanned the horizon, the thoughts of both strayed away to their little native town on the Baltic—where, probably, the housetops were then covered with snow and the waters bound in chains of ice; but where, also, troops of children were singing Christmas hymns and Christmas bells were ringing, while prayers were no doubt being offered up for them, so distant and yet so near in spirit!Eric, however, was not long pensive. The day was too bright and fine for him to be sorrowful or reflective for any length of time; so, after staying by the side of Fritz for a short while on the shore, sharing his thoughts about the dear ones far away—although neither uttered a word on the subject the one to the other—his impulsive nature quickly asserted itself, as usual.“I’m off, old fellow,” said the young sailor, slinging the basket of freshly picked peas on his arm and leaving the bundle of potatoes for Fritz to carry. “It is getting near the noonday hour, and time for me to be thinking of preparing dinner!”“All right, laddie, go on and I will follow you soon,” replied the other, but, still, without making any move from his seat on the shingle.“Mind, and don’t forget the potatoes,” cried Eric, who was already half-way towards their hut. “I shall want them soon!”“All right,” replied the other, but the mention of the potatoes, which had been an anxious consideration with Fritz all along, seemed to have the effect of banishing his sad reflections; for, in another minute, he, with his bundle on arm, followed Eric up the incline that led to the cottage.Considering all things, the two had a capital Christmas dinner. Indeed, Eric, the cook, so greatly distinguished himself on this occasion that he blotted out all recollection of his previous mishaps when undertaking a similar rôle.What say you to a splendid ham, one of those given them by Captain Brown; green peas, fresh and tender and dressed to perfection; and, new potatoes?Many a person might have a worse meal on a warm summer day, like it was this anniversary of the festival on Inaccessible Island!Nor was this all; for, after the more substantial portion of the feast, Eric introduced a wonderfully savoury compound in the confectionery line, which he had manufactured with some care. This consisted of flour and sugar made into a thick paste, with some of those very preserved peaches which had figured so prominently in the despised stew that had been Eric’s first essay in cooking, placed within the envelope, the compound being then boiled in a saucepan until thoroughly done.During the early months of the new year, the brothers had little to do save attending to their garden, digging up the remaining potatoes when ripe, and then storing them in a corner of their hut. They also cleared some more land and planted out the little seedling cabbages in long rows, so that in time they had a fine show of this vegetable, which was especially valuable as an antiscorbutic to the continuous use of salt meat,—now their main nutriment with the exception of a few birds which Fritz brought down occasionally with his fowling piece.Once or twice they went round the promontory in their boat, in pursuit of stray single seals; but, the animals were so shy that only a long shot could be had at them. This made it a risky and almost needless task to waste gunpowder in their pursuit; for, in the event of the animals being merely wounded and not killed right out at once, they invariably slipped off the rocks, disappearing in deep water before the brothers had time to row up to them and haul them into the boat.Under these circumstances, therefore, although they expended a considerable number of bullets, they had only two more sealskins to show in return to add to their great hauls at the commencement of the season; so, after a third unsuccessful expedition early in the new year, they made up their minds to leave the animals alone until the following summer. Then, they determined to begin their campaign before the Tristaners should forestall them, hoping to secure a large number by a newly-organised system of capture—Eric assailing them from the shore by way of the descent from the tableland on the western coast, while Fritz attacked them by sea in the boat.“Talking of expeditions,” said Eric, while the two were thus planning together their future seal campaign—“we haven’t been up on the cliffs for a long time now; suppose we ascend the plateau and see how the pigs and goats are getting on, eh?”“That’s a very good idea,” replied his brother. “The garden is in good order now, needing nothing further to be done to it for some time; while, as for reading, I’m sure I have devoured every book in our little library, including Shakespeare, which I know by heart—so, there’s nothing to occupy my mind with.”“I’m in the same position precisely,” said Eric. “You therefore agree to our hunting expedition, eh?”“Yes; the more especially as I wish to try and pot that old billy-goat. He is such an artful old fellow that he always keeps just out of range of my weapon, as if he knows the distance it carries. He will thus offer good sport. That other kid too, that we saw, must be grown up by now.”“He shall be my prey,” cried Eric, proceeding immediately to polish his rifle, so as to be ready for the excursion.A day or two afterwards, the two ascended the cliff by the now familiar tussock-grass ladder; but, although Eric could almost have gone up blindfold this time, the ascent was quite as difficult as it had been at first to Fritz, who had never climbed it once since the day he sprained his ankle in coming down, having left the look-out department entirely to the sailor lad, on account, as he said, of its “being more in his line!”As he had not, therefore, seen it for so long, Fritz noticed a considerable change on going up.The grass had grown very much taller, while the trees appeared more bushy; but, besides these alterations, the inhabitants of the plateau had become changed and more varied.The droves of wild hogs had increased considerably; while the goats, headed by the old billy, who looked as lively and venerable as ever, had diminished—of course, through the ravages of the Tristaners, as mentioned before.Still, not even the loss of these latter animals specially attracted his attention; what he particularly observed was, that the prairie tableland had a fresh class of visitors, which must have arrived with the new year, for they had not been there when he had previously ascended the cliff.Eric was too much taken up with looking for seals to notice them, for he certainly never mentioned them on his return below to the hut; and, so, Fritz was doubly surprised now at seeing them.These newcomers were the wandering albatross—the “Diomedia exulans,” as naturalists term it—which sailors believe to float constantly in the upper air, never alighting on land or sea, but living perpetually on the wing!Eric was firmly convinced of this from what he had been told when on board thePilot’s Bride; but Fritz, of course, expressed doubts of the bird having any such fabulous existence when it was pointed out to him while illustrating “flight without motion,” as its graceful movement through the air might be described. Now, he had ocular demonstration of the fact that the albatross not only rests its weary feet on solid earth sometimes, but that it also builds a nest, and, marvellous to relate, actually lays eggs!No sooner had Fritz set foot on the plateau, after a weary climb up the toilsome staircase which the tussock-grass and irregularities of the cliff afforded, than he startled one of these birds. It was straddling on the ground in a funny fashion over a little heap of rubbish, as the pile appeared to him. The albatross was quite in the open part of the tableland, and the reason why it selected such a spot for its resting-place, instead of amid the brushwood and tussock-grass thickets that spread over the plateau, was apparent at once when the bird was disturbed; for, it had to take a short run along the bare ground before it could get its pinions thoroughly inflated and rise in the air. Had it been amidst the trees or long grass, Fritz would have been able to approach it and knock it over before it could have sought safety in flight, on account of its long wings requiring a wide space for their expansion.On proceeding to the little heap of rubbish, as Fritz thought it, from which the albatross had risen, he found it to be a nest. This was built, like that of an ostrich, about a foot high from the surface of the ground, on the exterior side, and three feet or so in diameter; while the interior was constructed of grass and pieces of stick woven together with clay. There was one large egg in the centre of this nest, a little bigger than that of a swan and quite white, with the exception of a band of small bright red spots which encircled the larger end.In addition to the albatross, several nests of which were scattered about the open ground on the plateau to the number of a hundred or more, there were lots of mollymawks and terns, or “sea swallows.” These latter were beautifully plumaged, Fritz thought, the wings and body being delicately harmonised in white and pale grey, while tiny black heads and red beaks and feet, further improved their dainty appearance.After noticing these new arrivals carefully, although he would not fire at any of them, thinking it needless destruction to kill any creatures but such as were required for food or other purposes, such as the seals, Fritz made after the goats. These, he soon discovered, had removed themselves, under the leadership of “Kaiser Billy”—as his brother had christened the big old male which had frightened them both by his shadow on the cliff—to the further side of the tableland, placing the width of the plateau between the brothers and themselves.“Artful old brute!” said Fritz on noticing this.“Ah, he doesn’t intend you to come near him to-day,” observed Eric. “He’s too wise to put himself within reach of your rifle.”“Is he?” replied the other, beginning to get vexed, as the goat dexterously managed to preserve the same distance between them by shifting round in a sidling fashion as he and Eric advanced. “I tell you what, laddie, you go round one way, and I shall take the reverse direction. By that means we will circumvent the cunning old gentleman.”These tactics were adopted; but, by some keen intuitive instinct which warned him which of the brothers was most to be feared, “Kaiser Billy,” while allowing Eric many a time to get within range, still carefully kept out of Fritz’s reach!It was most provoking.“Hang the old fellow!” cried the elder between his clenched teeth. “I’ll have him yet;” and, thinking to deceive the animal’s wariness by pretending to give up the chase, he sat down in one of the nests of the albatross, whence he could command a good view around of the several thickets of grass and brushwood, asking Eric to continue driving the goats towards him while he lay here concealed.This Eric did, after first shooting the plumpest-looking of the females, which had the effect of scaring the rest and making them run in the direction where Fritz was lying in ambush.The goats, however, went faster than either of the brothers expected; so Fritz, seeing them coming out of a clump of brushwood in the distance just after Eric had brought down his selected victim, immediately crouched down in his retreat. Hearing soon afterwards, however, the sound of the animals’ hoofs, he was afraid of raising his head to make an observation as to their whereabouts until they should come closer, thinking that his sudden appearance might cause them race off again in another direction and lose him the chance of a shot.He had not to wait long, for the goats came closer and closer—too close, indeed, to be pleasant!“Look out, Fritz! look out, brother! they’re right on top of you,” shouted out Eric from the distance, away behind the flock, now coming up at a gallop, and still headed by the venerable “Kaiser Billy.”Fritz at once scrambled to his feet, rifle in hand, cocking the weapon as he rose up; but, at the same instant that he stood on his legs, a blow like a battering ram struck him in the small of the back, sending him down flying to the ground again on his face and pitching the cocked rifle out of his hands.This was not the end of it, either; for, the weapon went off with a loud bang as it fell beside him, the bullet penetrating his leg just below the knee in an upward direction and narrowly escaping his head. As for “Kaiser Billy,” who had butted him as he rose up, and thus did the damage, he galloped off with a loud “baa” of triumph, as if shouting a paean of victory.“Himmel! are you hurt, Fritz?” called out Eric, hastening up on hearing the report of the rifle. He was alarmed at seeing his brother lying motionless on the ground.But, there was no answer; nor did Fritz even move at the sound of his voice!
After his last remark, Eric, silent for a little while, as if buried in deep thought, followed behind his brother to the garden patch, which was found in the most flourishing state.
The potatoes were all in full flower and the haulms of sturdy growth promised well for the crop of tubers beneath, some indeed being already half withered, as if fit for digging; while pods were thick on the two rows of peas planted, and the scarlet runners were a mass of bloom and brilliancy.
At such a glorious sight, Eric could remain silent no longer.
“This is capital,” he exclaimed in high delight; “why, we’ve got a regular harvest, brother!”
“Yes, the great Mother Earth has rewarded our exertions,” said Fritz thoughtfully. “It is wonderful how she yields to those who cultivate her properly! I can see that we’ll have bushels of potatoes—enough to last us through the winter.”
“Aye, and peas and beans, too,” chorussed Eric. “Look, here, at this lot, Fritz! I believe we can have a dish of them to-day.”
“What, to keep up the festival with?” said his brother, smiling. “I see you are still thinking of that; but, methinks, green peas at Christmas will be rather an anachronism!”
“Hang the what-do-you-call-it—oh, anachronism!” cried the lad impulsively. “When we’re at Rome we must do as Rome does.”
“I don’t remember, though, that the citizens of ‘The city on the seven hills’ ate peas in December, as far as my reading of the classics go,” remarked Fritz ironically.
He liked to “pick up” his brother sometimes in fun.
“Ah, that was because they were pagans, and didn’t keep up our Christmas ceremonies!” cried Eric triumphantly. “Still, Romans or no Romans, I declare we’ll have a rare banquet to-day, brother, eh!”
“No roast beef, I hope!”
“Oh no, bother it—something better than that! You just let me alone and you’ll see bye-and-bye!”
“All right, laddie, I don’t mind leaving the cooking in your hands, now,” said Fritz kindly, wishing to blot out the recollection of his last remark. “You have had experience since your first memorable attempt, which I must say was perhaps excusable under the circumstances.”
“You are a brick, old fellow,” responded Eric, much pleased at this speech. “Only trust matters to my hands and, I promise you I’ll not let you have any opportunity to find fault with me a second time!”
“Very good; that’s agreed,” said Fritz; and, after thus settling matters, the two then went about the garden, gathering its produce—the elder digging up some new potatoes for trial, while Eric picked all the early peas that seemed fit, quite filling a good-sized basket which he had brought with him; although Fritz, who had not been so thoughtful, had to put his potatoes in a handkerchief.
On their way home, the brothers passed through the deserted penguin rookery, with never a bark or a grumble from the whilom excited birds as they tramped the well-worn paths which they had made from the thicket to the beach.
The inhabitants of the feathered colony were now educating their little ones in the art of fishing; and, the scene in front of the bay was quite enlivening as the birds swam about gracefully in curves, losing in the sea that ungainliness and ugly, awkward appearance which seemed inseparable from them on land, and prosecuting their task, without any of the noise that had distinguished them while breeding.
Birds were darting about—here, there, and everywhere in the water; some, swimming after each other as if in a race, like a shoal of fish; others, again, chasing one another on the surface, on which they seemed to run, using the ends of their wings, or flappers, to propel them like oars, for they dipped in the tips of their pinions and scattered the spray in their progress. To add to the charm, the calm expanse of sea reflected the pure ultramarine blue of the sky above, being illumined at the same time by the bright sunlight, which brought out in strong relief the twin headlands embracing the little bay with their outstretching arms.
Nothing, indeed, could be more unlike the crusoes’ old associations of Christmas and Christmas-tide than this prospect presented, nothing less suggestive of: home; and yet, standing there, on the shore of their lonely sea-girt and cliff-embattled island home, gazing across the ocean that spanned the horizon, the thoughts of both strayed away to their little native town on the Baltic—where, probably, the housetops were then covered with snow and the waters bound in chains of ice; but where, also, troops of children were singing Christmas hymns and Christmas bells were ringing, while prayers were no doubt being offered up for them, so distant and yet so near in spirit!
Eric, however, was not long pensive. The day was too bright and fine for him to be sorrowful or reflective for any length of time; so, after staying by the side of Fritz for a short while on the shore, sharing his thoughts about the dear ones far away—although neither uttered a word on the subject the one to the other—his impulsive nature quickly asserted itself, as usual.
“I’m off, old fellow,” said the young sailor, slinging the basket of freshly picked peas on his arm and leaving the bundle of potatoes for Fritz to carry. “It is getting near the noonday hour, and time for me to be thinking of preparing dinner!”
“All right, laddie, go on and I will follow you soon,” replied the other, but, still, without making any move from his seat on the shingle.
“Mind, and don’t forget the potatoes,” cried Eric, who was already half-way towards their hut. “I shall want them soon!”
“All right,” replied the other, but the mention of the potatoes, which had been an anxious consideration with Fritz all along, seemed to have the effect of banishing his sad reflections; for, in another minute, he, with his bundle on arm, followed Eric up the incline that led to the cottage.
Considering all things, the two had a capital Christmas dinner. Indeed, Eric, the cook, so greatly distinguished himself on this occasion that he blotted out all recollection of his previous mishaps when undertaking a similar rôle.
What say you to a splendid ham, one of those given them by Captain Brown; green peas, fresh and tender and dressed to perfection; and, new potatoes?
Many a person might have a worse meal on a warm summer day, like it was this anniversary of the festival on Inaccessible Island!
Nor was this all; for, after the more substantial portion of the feast, Eric introduced a wonderfully savoury compound in the confectionery line, which he had manufactured with some care. This consisted of flour and sugar made into a thick paste, with some of those very preserved peaches which had figured so prominently in the despised stew that had been Eric’s first essay in cooking, placed within the envelope, the compound being then boiled in a saucepan until thoroughly done.
During the early months of the new year, the brothers had little to do save attending to their garden, digging up the remaining potatoes when ripe, and then storing them in a corner of their hut. They also cleared some more land and planted out the little seedling cabbages in long rows, so that in time they had a fine show of this vegetable, which was especially valuable as an antiscorbutic to the continuous use of salt meat,—now their main nutriment with the exception of a few birds which Fritz brought down occasionally with his fowling piece.
Once or twice they went round the promontory in their boat, in pursuit of stray single seals; but, the animals were so shy that only a long shot could be had at them. This made it a risky and almost needless task to waste gunpowder in their pursuit; for, in the event of the animals being merely wounded and not killed right out at once, they invariably slipped off the rocks, disappearing in deep water before the brothers had time to row up to them and haul them into the boat.
Under these circumstances, therefore, although they expended a considerable number of bullets, they had only two more sealskins to show in return to add to their great hauls at the commencement of the season; so, after a third unsuccessful expedition early in the new year, they made up their minds to leave the animals alone until the following summer. Then, they determined to begin their campaign before the Tristaners should forestall them, hoping to secure a large number by a newly-organised system of capture—Eric assailing them from the shore by way of the descent from the tableland on the western coast, while Fritz attacked them by sea in the boat.
“Talking of expeditions,” said Eric, while the two were thus planning together their future seal campaign—“we haven’t been up on the cliffs for a long time now; suppose we ascend the plateau and see how the pigs and goats are getting on, eh?”
“That’s a very good idea,” replied his brother. “The garden is in good order now, needing nothing further to be done to it for some time; while, as for reading, I’m sure I have devoured every book in our little library, including Shakespeare, which I know by heart—so, there’s nothing to occupy my mind with.”
“I’m in the same position precisely,” said Eric. “You therefore agree to our hunting expedition, eh?”
“Yes; the more especially as I wish to try and pot that old billy-goat. He is such an artful old fellow that he always keeps just out of range of my weapon, as if he knows the distance it carries. He will thus offer good sport. That other kid too, that we saw, must be grown up by now.”
“He shall be my prey,” cried Eric, proceeding immediately to polish his rifle, so as to be ready for the excursion.
A day or two afterwards, the two ascended the cliff by the now familiar tussock-grass ladder; but, although Eric could almost have gone up blindfold this time, the ascent was quite as difficult as it had been at first to Fritz, who had never climbed it once since the day he sprained his ankle in coming down, having left the look-out department entirely to the sailor lad, on account, as he said, of its “being more in his line!”
As he had not, therefore, seen it for so long, Fritz noticed a considerable change on going up.
The grass had grown very much taller, while the trees appeared more bushy; but, besides these alterations, the inhabitants of the plateau had become changed and more varied.
The droves of wild hogs had increased considerably; while the goats, headed by the old billy, who looked as lively and venerable as ever, had diminished—of course, through the ravages of the Tristaners, as mentioned before.
Still, not even the loss of these latter animals specially attracted his attention; what he particularly observed was, that the prairie tableland had a fresh class of visitors, which must have arrived with the new year, for they had not been there when he had previously ascended the cliff.
Eric was too much taken up with looking for seals to notice them, for he certainly never mentioned them on his return below to the hut; and, so, Fritz was doubly surprised now at seeing them.
These newcomers were the wandering albatross—the “Diomedia exulans,” as naturalists term it—which sailors believe to float constantly in the upper air, never alighting on land or sea, but living perpetually on the wing!
Eric was firmly convinced of this from what he had been told when on board thePilot’s Bride; but Fritz, of course, expressed doubts of the bird having any such fabulous existence when it was pointed out to him while illustrating “flight without motion,” as its graceful movement through the air might be described. Now, he had ocular demonstration of the fact that the albatross not only rests its weary feet on solid earth sometimes, but that it also builds a nest, and, marvellous to relate, actually lays eggs!
No sooner had Fritz set foot on the plateau, after a weary climb up the toilsome staircase which the tussock-grass and irregularities of the cliff afforded, than he startled one of these birds. It was straddling on the ground in a funny fashion over a little heap of rubbish, as the pile appeared to him. The albatross was quite in the open part of the tableland, and the reason why it selected such a spot for its resting-place, instead of amid the brushwood and tussock-grass thickets that spread over the plateau, was apparent at once when the bird was disturbed; for, it had to take a short run along the bare ground before it could get its pinions thoroughly inflated and rise in the air. Had it been amidst the trees or long grass, Fritz would have been able to approach it and knock it over before it could have sought safety in flight, on account of its long wings requiring a wide space for their expansion.
On proceeding to the little heap of rubbish, as Fritz thought it, from which the albatross had risen, he found it to be a nest. This was built, like that of an ostrich, about a foot high from the surface of the ground, on the exterior side, and three feet or so in diameter; while the interior was constructed of grass and pieces of stick woven together with clay. There was one large egg in the centre of this nest, a little bigger than that of a swan and quite white, with the exception of a band of small bright red spots which encircled the larger end.
In addition to the albatross, several nests of which were scattered about the open ground on the plateau to the number of a hundred or more, there were lots of mollymawks and terns, or “sea swallows.” These latter were beautifully plumaged, Fritz thought, the wings and body being delicately harmonised in white and pale grey, while tiny black heads and red beaks and feet, further improved their dainty appearance.
After noticing these new arrivals carefully, although he would not fire at any of them, thinking it needless destruction to kill any creatures but such as were required for food or other purposes, such as the seals, Fritz made after the goats. These, he soon discovered, had removed themselves, under the leadership of “Kaiser Billy”—as his brother had christened the big old male which had frightened them both by his shadow on the cliff—to the further side of the tableland, placing the width of the plateau between the brothers and themselves.
“Artful old brute!” said Fritz on noticing this.
“Ah, he doesn’t intend you to come near him to-day,” observed Eric. “He’s too wise to put himself within reach of your rifle.”
“Is he?” replied the other, beginning to get vexed, as the goat dexterously managed to preserve the same distance between them by shifting round in a sidling fashion as he and Eric advanced. “I tell you what, laddie, you go round one way, and I shall take the reverse direction. By that means we will circumvent the cunning old gentleman.”
These tactics were adopted; but, by some keen intuitive instinct which warned him which of the brothers was most to be feared, “Kaiser Billy,” while allowing Eric many a time to get within range, still carefully kept out of Fritz’s reach!
It was most provoking.
“Hang the old fellow!” cried the elder between his clenched teeth. “I’ll have him yet;” and, thinking to deceive the animal’s wariness by pretending to give up the chase, he sat down in one of the nests of the albatross, whence he could command a good view around of the several thickets of grass and brushwood, asking Eric to continue driving the goats towards him while he lay here concealed.
This Eric did, after first shooting the plumpest-looking of the females, which had the effect of scaring the rest and making them run in the direction where Fritz was lying in ambush.
The goats, however, went faster than either of the brothers expected; so Fritz, seeing them coming out of a clump of brushwood in the distance just after Eric had brought down his selected victim, immediately crouched down in his retreat. Hearing soon afterwards, however, the sound of the animals’ hoofs, he was afraid of raising his head to make an observation as to their whereabouts until they should come closer, thinking that his sudden appearance might cause them race off again in another direction and lose him the chance of a shot.
He had not to wait long, for the goats came closer and closer—too close, indeed, to be pleasant!
“Look out, Fritz! look out, brother! they’re right on top of you,” shouted out Eric from the distance, away behind the flock, now coming up at a gallop, and still headed by the venerable “Kaiser Billy.”
Fritz at once scrambled to his feet, rifle in hand, cocking the weapon as he rose up; but, at the same instant that he stood on his legs, a blow like a battering ram struck him in the small of the back, sending him down flying to the ground again on his face and pitching the cocked rifle out of his hands.
This was not the end of it, either; for, the weapon went off with a loud bang as it fell beside him, the bullet penetrating his leg just below the knee in an upward direction and narrowly escaping his head. As for “Kaiser Billy,” who had butted him as he rose up, and thus did the damage, he galloped off with a loud “baa” of triumph, as if shouting a paean of victory.
“Himmel! are you hurt, Fritz?” called out Eric, hastening up on hearing the report of the rifle. He was alarmed at seeing his brother lying motionless on the ground.
But, there was no answer; nor did Fritz even move at the sound of his voice!
Chapter Thirty.Another Mishap.In another minute Eric arrived where his brother was lying; when, throwing himself on his knees, he bent over him anxiously. “Oh, Fritz, are you badly hurt?” he cried: and, still receiving no answer, he burst into a passion of sobs. “He’s dead, he’s dead!” he wailed in a broken voice—“dead, never to speak to me more!”“No, laddie, not quite dead yet,” whispered Fritz faintly. The sudden blow in the back from the goat’s horns, striking him as it did at the base of the spine, had rendered him for the moment unconscious; the unexpected attack had injured him terribly—more so, indeed, than the bullet wound through his leg. Besides, he was lying face downwards, and so was unable to turn over, which fact prevented him from speaking more plainly when he recovered his senses.“Not dead? Oh, I am so glad!” shouted out Eric joyously, in sudden revulsion of feeling. “I was afraid that you were killed!”“I feel pretty near it,” said Fritz, although he spoke now in a stronger tone, Eric having partly raised him up, by putting his arm under his neck. “Gently, laddie, gently,” he called out, however, as his brother lifted him, “my poor back hurts fearfully!”“I thought it was your leg, Fritz, for it is bleeding awfully. Your trousers are wet with blood!”“That’s nothing, laddie—nothing to speak of,” said Fritz.“Oh, isn’t it?” cried the other, who had been busily cutting away the trouser leg and stocking with his sheath knife. “Why, the bullet has gone through the fleshy part of your calf.”“I wish it had gone through the horny part of that horrid old goat,” said Fritz grimly, smiling at his own joke, which made Eric laugh.“The old brute! But, you would go after him, you know.”“Yes; still, I am suffering now, and perhaps justly, for not leaving the poor animal alone. He never harmed me before I tried to harm him, so it only serves me right! It’s a bad job, Eric; I’m afraid I shan’t be able to get down to the hut again. You will have to rig me up some sort of shelter here.”“Oh, no, that won’t be necessary,” said Eric, glad that his brother seemed to be getting more like his old calm self and able to look matters in the face.“Why, how can I move? Do you think I shall be able to climb down that abominable tussock-grass ladder in this condition, especially when I was hardly able to manage it while sound in wind and limb—which I can’t say is the case at present?”“I didn’t think of your getting down that way, old fellow,” said the lad, after a moment’s reflection. “I’ve got another plan in my noddle—a better one than yours I think.”“And what is that?” asked Fritz.“Why, you know where you are now, don’t you?”“Yes, I should think I did; I haven’t quite lost my consciousness yet!”“You are close to the western side of the coast, just near where the plateau slopes down to the sea by our sealing ground.”“Well, what of that?”“Why, don’t you see through my plan yet, brother? Can I not pull the whale-boat round from our bay, and then manage to lift you down the incline here into it—thus getting you back home easily in that way?”“Himmel, Eric, you’re a grand fellow,” exclaimed Fritz, in honest admiration of the proposal. “I declare I never thought of such a simple thing as that. Of course it can be done. What a stupid I was, not to think of it! That old goat must have knocked all my seven senses out of my head; for, I declare I never recollected that there was any other way of getting down from here save by the waterfall gully!”“Ah, well, there is another way,” said Eric, laughing joyously. “But, really we must now see about using it, for I don’t want you to remain up here all night when you may be so much more comfortable in the hut. I will scramble down and fetch round the boat at once, if there is nothing more I can do for you before I go—is there anything you wish?”“No, nothing, now that you’ve raised my head and propped it up so nicely with your coat. I should be glad, though, if you will bring a can of water with you when you come back with the boat.”“Stay, I’ll get some for you now!” cried the lad; and, flying across the plateau, he was soon half-way down a niche in the gully whence he could reach the cascade. In a few minutes more, he was up again on the tableland and by the side of Fritz, with his cap full of the welcome water, which tasted to the sufferer, already feverish from the bullet wound—which Eric had bandaged up to stop the bleeding—more delicious than nectar, more strengthening than wine. It at once brought the colour back to his cheek and the fire to his eye.“Ha!” Fritz exclaimed, “that draught has made a new man of me, laddie. You may be off as soon as you please, now, to fetch the boat; while I will wait patiently here until you can bring it round the headland. How’s the wind?”“South-east and by south,” cried the young sailor promptly.“That will be all in your favour, then. Go now, laddie, and don’t be longer than you can help.”“You may depend on that,” cried Eric, pressing his brother’s hand softly; and, in another moment, he was racing again across the plateau to the point where the two had ascended from the gully by the waterfall.Ere long, Eric had brought round the whale-boat to the haunt of the seals on the west beach; when, after a good deal of labour, in which he could not help hurting Fritz somewhat, he succeeded in getting the sufferer down the sloping rocks. Thence, he lifted him bodily into the stern-sheets of the boat, where he had prepared a comfortable couch by piling up on the bottom grating all the blankets and rugs from the hut.Eric had a hard pull back against the wind and tide round the headland, there being none to help him with an oar; but, naturally indomitable, he bravely accomplished the task at last, arriving back at the bay before sunset with his almost unconscious burden, who was now unable to move or assist him in the least.Fortunately, the most arduous part of the transportation was now accomplished, the remainder being “all plain sailing,” as Eric said.The lad certainly had a most inventive mind; for, as soon as they reached their own little bay, he once more astonished Fritz—who was glad enough to get so far, but puzzled as to how he would ever arrive at the hut, knowing that the lad would never be able to carry him there.“Now, brother,” cried Eric, “you just stop quietly where you are a minute or two while I get the carriage ready.”“The carriage?” cried Fritz, more puzzled than ever. “What do you mean, laddie?”“The wheelbarrow, of course,” answered Eric, laughing. “See, I have put the door of our hut across it; and, with the bedding on top of this, I shall be able to wheel you, without the slightest jolting, right up to the cottage.”“Donnerwetter!” exclaimed Fritz—“you’re a wonderful lad; you seem to think of everything.”“Nonsense! Silence, now—you mustn’t talk; it might bring on fever perhaps!” exclaimed Eric, to stop his brother’s grateful expressions. Then, lifting him out carefully from the boat, he placed the invalid on the novel ambulance wagon he had so ingeniously improvised; and, rolling the wheelbarrow along the little pathway up the incline that led to the hut, he proceeded carefully to transport him home. Arrived here, Eric at once put Fritz to bed, so that he might be able to examine his injuries more closely and apply proper bandages to the wounded leg and back, in place of the temporary appliances he had made shift with when first attending to the wounded hero, who was now able to direct him what to do and how to do it.Eric could not help thinking what an unlucky fellow that elder brother of his was!The cliff seemed fatal to him; for, the first time he ascended it, he sprained his ankle, which laid him up for three weeks; and now he had hurt himself even worse. Really, the sailor lad wished there were no crags at all; but, should that devout consummation not be feasible, then he wished there were no means of getting to the summit, for then Fritz would never incur any danger through climbing there.Little did Eric think, as these hasty reflections passed through his mind, that, in a very short while, his last wish would be gratified—and that in a way, too, which would seriously affect them both!The very next morning, indeed, he was glad enough to go up the cliff by the tussock-grass ladder, in order to fetch the young goat he had shot the day before, which, in the excitement of Fritz’s accident, had been left behind on the plateau; and, as he was coming down the gully again, he saw the old goat “Kaiser Billy,” and shook his fist at him.“You old rascal!” he cried—“had it not been for you and your nasty horns, poor Fritz would be now all right.”He then fired a shot at the animal in the distance; but, the knowing fellow, who must have noticed the lad’s deadly aim the previous afternoon—when he had slain one of his family while she was galloping along beside him—now kept carefully out of the range of Eric’s rifle, so that the bullet did not fall any way near him, so the lad had to descend the tussock-grass ladder in a somewhat disappointed frame of mind.He had not wished actually to hurt the old goat, but merely to give him a sort of mild lesson anent his impudent treatment of Fritz. However, the astute animal declined learning even from so gentle an instructor as Eric, despite the possibility of the lad having his welfare at heart!This was the last time the sailor lad ever had the chance to climb up or down the face of the cliff by means of the much-abused ladder-way; for, within the next few days, a sudden mishap happened that cleared the tangled masses of grass away in a jiffy, leaving the precipitous pass through the gorge bare—the grim rocks thenceforth disclosing themselves in all their naked ruggedness, for, there were no friendly tendrils hanging down whereby to escalade the heights.The accident occurred in this wise.When clearing the land for the garden, a large amount of brushwood and weeds had to be removed from its surface. These, when cut down and dug up, made a large heap of rubbish, which, for the sake of neatness and being out of the way, was piled up at the bottom of the gorge adjoining the waterfall—the embrasure of the gully making a capital dust-hole, as Eric had suggested.From the effects of the hot sun, this rubbish was now as dry as straw; so, one afternoon, when Fritz had so far recovered from his injuries as to be able to crawl out of the hut and sit on a bench outside, which the two had constructed under a rude sort of porch, Eric determined to signalise his brother’s convalescence by having a bonfire in honour of the event.To the impulsive lad it was all one to think of such a thing and to carry out the idea. In a moment, rushing from Fritz’s side, he had drawn his inseparable box of matches from his pocket, struck a light, and ignited the pile of rubbish.“Doesn’t it flare up splendidly?” he cried with glee as he watched the tongue-like flames darting upwards, the whole body of dry material being soon in a red fiery glow, so hot and scorching that the lad had to move away from the vicinity; and, returning to the front of the hut he stood for a time by the side of Fritz, gazing with great admiration at the blaze, which, mounting higher and higher, quickly enveloped the gorge with clouds of that light, pungent smoke which wood fires always give out.“Yes, it burns well enough,” said the calm, methodical Fritz; “but, perhaps, laddie, it will spread farther than you intend. I fear it will burn up the little wood to the right of our garden, with all the poor thrushes and other birds in it. It is easy enough to start a fire, you know: the difficulty is to limit its action and put it out when you wish!”“Oh, there’s no fear about that,” replied Eric with great nonchalance. “The wind is blowing from the north-east and will only carry the flames against the cliff, where there is nothing to harm.”Was there not?Higher and higher rose the smoke, ascending pyramidically up the chimney-like gorge; and, the quick-darting tongues of flame could be seen spreading through the hazy veil, while the crackle and roar of the fire sounded fiercer and fiercer. Presently, growing bolder in its strength, the fire advanced outwards from the cleft in the rock where it was first kindled, spreading to the right and left of the gully. Next, it began to clamber up the face of the cliff, burning away gaily even right under the waterfall, which seemed powerless to stay its rapid progress.“Look, Eric,” cried Fritz, “it has caught the tussock grass now close to our ladder. I told you it would do mischief!”“Bother it all, so it has!” exclaimed the lad, darting off with the vain intention of trying to stop the conflagration.He might just as well have attempted to arrest the flow of the sea in the little bay below by the aid of his much-detested spade!Crackle, crackle—puff—whish; and, in another few moments, the whole cliff seemed on fire, the flames licking every particle of herbage off the face of the rock.The heat soon made the solid stone glow like molten iron; while the columns of white smoke, as they rose up, were swept by the wind over the tableland, frightening away several of the albatross, which hovered over the scene of devastation on poised wing, wondering apparently what all the fuss was about!The fire gradually burnt itself out when there was nothing more to consume, only an angry pile of smouldering embers remaining below the waterfall, which still danced and tumbled itself over the blackened edges of the crags, no longer festooned with the tussock-grass and shrubs which had previously given the brothers handhold and foothold when climbing to the summit of the cliff.The ladder up to Eric’s look-out station being now irremediably destroyed, henceforth the sphere of action of the brother crusoes would be limited to the confined valley in which they had landed and built their home; for, there was now no means of reaching the tableland, save by the pass on the western side near their sealing station, to reach which they would have to use the whale-boat and venture out to sea, round the eastern or western headland.They were now really shut completely within their little valley, without a chance of escaping in any sudden emergency, except by taking to the water!The destruction of the ladder-way was a sad calamity; but, that was not the worst of the damage done by Eric’s bonfire!It was late in the afternoon when the lad first lit up the pile of rubbish and night came ere the fire had died out, its blazing light, reflected back by the glistening surface of the cliff, shining out to sea from the bay, like a beacon welcoming the passing mariner to friendly shores—instead of which, the cruel crags that encircled the island only grinned through the surf, like the pointed teeth of a pack of snarling wolves, waiting to rend and tear any hapless craft that should make for them!In addition to this, there was yet another peril to any ship in the vicinity; for, the wind from the north-east had risen to a gale as the evening set in, bringing with it a heavy, rolling swell that thundered in upon the beach with a harsh, grating roar, throwing up columns of spray over the projecting peaks of the headlands on either hand.“I hope no vessel will mistake your bonfire for a beacon,” said Fritz, as the darkness increased. “If so, and they should chance to approach the land, God help them, with this wind and sea on!”“I trust not,” replied Eric sadly, already regretting his handiwork; “it would be a bad look-out for them!”But, as he spoke the words, the sound of a cannon could be heard coming from seaward over the water; and the lad shuddered with apprehension.
In another minute Eric arrived where his brother was lying; when, throwing himself on his knees, he bent over him anxiously. “Oh, Fritz, are you badly hurt?” he cried: and, still receiving no answer, he burst into a passion of sobs. “He’s dead, he’s dead!” he wailed in a broken voice—“dead, never to speak to me more!”
“No, laddie, not quite dead yet,” whispered Fritz faintly. The sudden blow in the back from the goat’s horns, striking him as it did at the base of the spine, had rendered him for the moment unconscious; the unexpected attack had injured him terribly—more so, indeed, than the bullet wound through his leg. Besides, he was lying face downwards, and so was unable to turn over, which fact prevented him from speaking more plainly when he recovered his senses.
“Not dead? Oh, I am so glad!” shouted out Eric joyously, in sudden revulsion of feeling. “I was afraid that you were killed!”
“I feel pretty near it,” said Fritz, although he spoke now in a stronger tone, Eric having partly raised him up, by putting his arm under his neck. “Gently, laddie, gently,” he called out, however, as his brother lifted him, “my poor back hurts fearfully!”
“I thought it was your leg, Fritz, for it is bleeding awfully. Your trousers are wet with blood!”
“That’s nothing, laddie—nothing to speak of,” said Fritz.
“Oh, isn’t it?” cried the other, who had been busily cutting away the trouser leg and stocking with his sheath knife. “Why, the bullet has gone through the fleshy part of your calf.”
“I wish it had gone through the horny part of that horrid old goat,” said Fritz grimly, smiling at his own joke, which made Eric laugh.
“The old brute! But, you would go after him, you know.”
“Yes; still, I am suffering now, and perhaps justly, for not leaving the poor animal alone. He never harmed me before I tried to harm him, so it only serves me right! It’s a bad job, Eric; I’m afraid I shan’t be able to get down to the hut again. You will have to rig me up some sort of shelter here.”
“Oh, no, that won’t be necessary,” said Eric, glad that his brother seemed to be getting more like his old calm self and able to look matters in the face.
“Why, how can I move? Do you think I shall be able to climb down that abominable tussock-grass ladder in this condition, especially when I was hardly able to manage it while sound in wind and limb—which I can’t say is the case at present?”
“I didn’t think of your getting down that way, old fellow,” said the lad, after a moment’s reflection. “I’ve got another plan in my noddle—a better one than yours I think.”
“And what is that?” asked Fritz.
“Why, you know where you are now, don’t you?”
“Yes, I should think I did; I haven’t quite lost my consciousness yet!”
“You are close to the western side of the coast, just near where the plateau slopes down to the sea by our sealing ground.”
“Well, what of that?”
“Why, don’t you see through my plan yet, brother? Can I not pull the whale-boat round from our bay, and then manage to lift you down the incline here into it—thus getting you back home easily in that way?”
“Himmel, Eric, you’re a grand fellow,” exclaimed Fritz, in honest admiration of the proposal. “I declare I never thought of such a simple thing as that. Of course it can be done. What a stupid I was, not to think of it! That old goat must have knocked all my seven senses out of my head; for, I declare I never recollected that there was any other way of getting down from here save by the waterfall gully!”
“Ah, well, there is another way,” said Eric, laughing joyously. “But, really we must now see about using it, for I don’t want you to remain up here all night when you may be so much more comfortable in the hut. I will scramble down and fetch round the boat at once, if there is nothing more I can do for you before I go—is there anything you wish?”
“No, nothing, now that you’ve raised my head and propped it up so nicely with your coat. I should be glad, though, if you will bring a can of water with you when you come back with the boat.”
“Stay, I’ll get some for you now!” cried the lad; and, flying across the plateau, he was soon half-way down a niche in the gully whence he could reach the cascade. In a few minutes more, he was up again on the tableland and by the side of Fritz, with his cap full of the welcome water, which tasted to the sufferer, already feverish from the bullet wound—which Eric had bandaged up to stop the bleeding—more delicious than nectar, more strengthening than wine. It at once brought the colour back to his cheek and the fire to his eye.
“Ha!” Fritz exclaimed, “that draught has made a new man of me, laddie. You may be off as soon as you please, now, to fetch the boat; while I will wait patiently here until you can bring it round the headland. How’s the wind?”
“South-east and by south,” cried the young sailor promptly.
“That will be all in your favour, then. Go now, laddie, and don’t be longer than you can help.”
“You may depend on that,” cried Eric, pressing his brother’s hand softly; and, in another moment, he was racing again across the plateau to the point where the two had ascended from the gully by the waterfall.
Ere long, Eric had brought round the whale-boat to the haunt of the seals on the west beach; when, after a good deal of labour, in which he could not help hurting Fritz somewhat, he succeeded in getting the sufferer down the sloping rocks. Thence, he lifted him bodily into the stern-sheets of the boat, where he had prepared a comfortable couch by piling up on the bottom grating all the blankets and rugs from the hut.
Eric had a hard pull back against the wind and tide round the headland, there being none to help him with an oar; but, naturally indomitable, he bravely accomplished the task at last, arriving back at the bay before sunset with his almost unconscious burden, who was now unable to move or assist him in the least.
Fortunately, the most arduous part of the transportation was now accomplished, the remainder being “all plain sailing,” as Eric said.
The lad certainly had a most inventive mind; for, as soon as they reached their own little bay, he once more astonished Fritz—who was glad enough to get so far, but puzzled as to how he would ever arrive at the hut, knowing that the lad would never be able to carry him there.
“Now, brother,” cried Eric, “you just stop quietly where you are a minute or two while I get the carriage ready.”
“The carriage?” cried Fritz, more puzzled than ever. “What do you mean, laddie?”
“The wheelbarrow, of course,” answered Eric, laughing. “See, I have put the door of our hut across it; and, with the bedding on top of this, I shall be able to wheel you, without the slightest jolting, right up to the cottage.”
“Donnerwetter!” exclaimed Fritz—“you’re a wonderful lad; you seem to think of everything.”
“Nonsense! Silence, now—you mustn’t talk; it might bring on fever perhaps!” exclaimed Eric, to stop his brother’s grateful expressions. Then, lifting him out carefully from the boat, he placed the invalid on the novel ambulance wagon he had so ingeniously improvised; and, rolling the wheelbarrow along the little pathway up the incline that led to the hut, he proceeded carefully to transport him home. Arrived here, Eric at once put Fritz to bed, so that he might be able to examine his injuries more closely and apply proper bandages to the wounded leg and back, in place of the temporary appliances he had made shift with when first attending to the wounded hero, who was now able to direct him what to do and how to do it.
Eric could not help thinking what an unlucky fellow that elder brother of his was!
The cliff seemed fatal to him; for, the first time he ascended it, he sprained his ankle, which laid him up for three weeks; and now he had hurt himself even worse. Really, the sailor lad wished there were no crags at all; but, should that devout consummation not be feasible, then he wished there were no means of getting to the summit, for then Fritz would never incur any danger through climbing there.
Little did Eric think, as these hasty reflections passed through his mind, that, in a very short while, his last wish would be gratified—and that in a way, too, which would seriously affect them both!
The very next morning, indeed, he was glad enough to go up the cliff by the tussock-grass ladder, in order to fetch the young goat he had shot the day before, which, in the excitement of Fritz’s accident, had been left behind on the plateau; and, as he was coming down the gully again, he saw the old goat “Kaiser Billy,” and shook his fist at him.
“You old rascal!” he cried—“had it not been for you and your nasty horns, poor Fritz would be now all right.”
He then fired a shot at the animal in the distance; but, the knowing fellow, who must have noticed the lad’s deadly aim the previous afternoon—when he had slain one of his family while she was galloping along beside him—now kept carefully out of the range of Eric’s rifle, so that the bullet did not fall any way near him, so the lad had to descend the tussock-grass ladder in a somewhat disappointed frame of mind.
He had not wished actually to hurt the old goat, but merely to give him a sort of mild lesson anent his impudent treatment of Fritz. However, the astute animal declined learning even from so gentle an instructor as Eric, despite the possibility of the lad having his welfare at heart!
This was the last time the sailor lad ever had the chance to climb up or down the face of the cliff by means of the much-abused ladder-way; for, within the next few days, a sudden mishap happened that cleared the tangled masses of grass away in a jiffy, leaving the precipitous pass through the gorge bare—the grim rocks thenceforth disclosing themselves in all their naked ruggedness, for, there were no friendly tendrils hanging down whereby to escalade the heights.
The accident occurred in this wise.
When clearing the land for the garden, a large amount of brushwood and weeds had to be removed from its surface. These, when cut down and dug up, made a large heap of rubbish, which, for the sake of neatness and being out of the way, was piled up at the bottom of the gorge adjoining the waterfall—the embrasure of the gully making a capital dust-hole, as Eric had suggested.
From the effects of the hot sun, this rubbish was now as dry as straw; so, one afternoon, when Fritz had so far recovered from his injuries as to be able to crawl out of the hut and sit on a bench outside, which the two had constructed under a rude sort of porch, Eric determined to signalise his brother’s convalescence by having a bonfire in honour of the event.
To the impulsive lad it was all one to think of such a thing and to carry out the idea. In a moment, rushing from Fritz’s side, he had drawn his inseparable box of matches from his pocket, struck a light, and ignited the pile of rubbish.
“Doesn’t it flare up splendidly?” he cried with glee as he watched the tongue-like flames darting upwards, the whole body of dry material being soon in a red fiery glow, so hot and scorching that the lad had to move away from the vicinity; and, returning to the front of the hut he stood for a time by the side of Fritz, gazing with great admiration at the blaze, which, mounting higher and higher, quickly enveloped the gorge with clouds of that light, pungent smoke which wood fires always give out.
“Yes, it burns well enough,” said the calm, methodical Fritz; “but, perhaps, laddie, it will spread farther than you intend. I fear it will burn up the little wood to the right of our garden, with all the poor thrushes and other birds in it. It is easy enough to start a fire, you know: the difficulty is to limit its action and put it out when you wish!”
“Oh, there’s no fear about that,” replied Eric with great nonchalance. “The wind is blowing from the north-east and will only carry the flames against the cliff, where there is nothing to harm.”
Was there not?
Higher and higher rose the smoke, ascending pyramidically up the chimney-like gorge; and, the quick-darting tongues of flame could be seen spreading through the hazy veil, while the crackle and roar of the fire sounded fiercer and fiercer. Presently, growing bolder in its strength, the fire advanced outwards from the cleft in the rock where it was first kindled, spreading to the right and left of the gully. Next, it began to clamber up the face of the cliff, burning away gaily even right under the waterfall, which seemed powerless to stay its rapid progress.
“Look, Eric,” cried Fritz, “it has caught the tussock grass now close to our ladder. I told you it would do mischief!”
“Bother it all, so it has!” exclaimed the lad, darting off with the vain intention of trying to stop the conflagration.
He might just as well have attempted to arrest the flow of the sea in the little bay below by the aid of his much-detested spade!
Crackle, crackle—puff—whish; and, in another few moments, the whole cliff seemed on fire, the flames licking every particle of herbage off the face of the rock.
The heat soon made the solid stone glow like molten iron; while the columns of white smoke, as they rose up, were swept by the wind over the tableland, frightening away several of the albatross, which hovered over the scene of devastation on poised wing, wondering apparently what all the fuss was about!
The fire gradually burnt itself out when there was nothing more to consume, only an angry pile of smouldering embers remaining below the waterfall, which still danced and tumbled itself over the blackened edges of the crags, no longer festooned with the tussock-grass and shrubs which had previously given the brothers handhold and foothold when climbing to the summit of the cliff.
The ladder up to Eric’s look-out station being now irremediably destroyed, henceforth the sphere of action of the brother crusoes would be limited to the confined valley in which they had landed and built their home; for, there was now no means of reaching the tableland, save by the pass on the western side near their sealing station, to reach which they would have to use the whale-boat and venture out to sea, round the eastern or western headland.
They were now really shut completely within their little valley, without a chance of escaping in any sudden emergency, except by taking to the water!
The destruction of the ladder-way was a sad calamity; but, that was not the worst of the damage done by Eric’s bonfire!
It was late in the afternoon when the lad first lit up the pile of rubbish and night came ere the fire had died out, its blazing light, reflected back by the glistening surface of the cliff, shining out to sea from the bay, like a beacon welcoming the passing mariner to friendly shores—instead of which, the cruel crags that encircled the island only grinned through the surf, like the pointed teeth of a pack of snarling wolves, waiting to rend and tear any hapless craft that should make for them!
In addition to this, there was yet another peril to any ship in the vicinity; for, the wind from the north-east had risen to a gale as the evening set in, bringing with it a heavy, rolling swell that thundered in upon the beach with a harsh, grating roar, throwing up columns of spray over the projecting peaks of the headlands on either hand.
“I hope no vessel will mistake your bonfire for a beacon,” said Fritz, as the darkness increased. “If so, and they should chance to approach the land, God help them, with this wind and sea on!”
“I trust not,” replied Eric sadly, already regretting his handiwork; “it would be a bad look-out for them!”
But, as he spoke the words, the sound of a cannon could be heard coming from seaward over the water; and the lad shuddered with apprehension.
Chapter Thirty One.The Wreck of the Brig.“Himmel!” exclaimed Fritz, rising up from the bench on which he was sitting and clutching on to the side of the hut for support, being still very feeble and hardly able to stand upright. “There must be a ship out there approaching the island. If she should get too close inshore, she is doomed!”But, Eric did not answer him. The lad had already rushed down to the beach; and, climbing on to a projecting boulder, was peering into the offing, endeavouring to make out the vessel whose signal gun had been heard in the distance.The darkness, however, was too great. The heavens were overcast with thick, drifting clouds, while the sea below was as black as ink—except where the breakers at the base of the cliffs broke in masses of foam that gave out a sort of phosphorescent light for the moment, lighting up the outlines of the headlands during the brief interval, only for them to be swallowed up the next instant in the sombre gloom that enwrapped the bay and surrounding scene. Eric, consequently, could see nothing beyond the wall of heaving water which the rollers presented as they thundered on the shingle, dragging back the pebbles in their back-wash with a rattling noise, as if the spirits of the deep were playing with dice in the depths below under the waves!At his back, the lad could see the bonfire still blazing, casting the foreground in all the deeper shadow from its flickering light; and, never did he regret anything more in his life than the sudden impulse which had led him into so dangerous a freak, as that of lighting the bonfire.Who knew what further terrible peril that treacherous fire might not lead to, besides the mischief it had already done?Bye-and-bye, there came the sound of another gun from the sea. The report sounded nearer this time; still, Eric could see nothing in sight on the horizon when some break in the clouds allowed him a momentary glimpse of the angry ocean—nothing but the huge billows chasing each other in towards the land and the seething foam at the base of the crags, on which they broke themselves in impotent fury when they found their further course arrested by the rocky ramparts of the island.Nor could the lad hear anything beyond the crash of the breakers and splash of the eddying water, which sometimes washed up to his feet, as he stood on the boulder gazing out vainly to sea, the sound of the breaking billows being mingled with the shriek of the wind as it whistled by overhead.Nothing but the tumult of the sea, stirred into frenzy by the storm-blast of angry Aeolus!After a time, Eric suddenly recollected that his brother could not move far from the hut and must be wondering what had become of him; and, recognising as well the fact that he was powerless alone to do anything where he was, even if a ship should be in danger, he returned towards the cottage to rejoin Fritz, his path up the valley being lit up quite clearly by the expiring bonfire, which still flamed out every now and then, as the wind fanned it in its mad rush up the gorge, stirring out the embers into an occasional flash of brilliancy.Fritz, usually so calm, was in a terribly anxious state when his brother reached him.“Well, have you seen anything?” he asked impatiently.“No,” said Eric sorrowfully. “There’s nothing to be seen.”“Butyouheard another cannon, did you not?”“Oh yes, and it seemed closer in.”“So I thought, too,” said the other, whom the sound of the heavy guns, from his old experience in war, appeared to affect like a stimulant. “Can’t we do anything? It is terrible to stand idly here and allow our fellow-creatures to perish, without trying to save them!”“What could we do?” asked Eric helplessly, all the buoyancy gone out of him. He seemed to be quite another lad.“You couldn’t launch the boat without me, eh?”“No,” answered Eric; “I couldn’t move it off the beach with all my strength—I tried just now.”Fritz ground his teeth in rage at his invalid condition.“It serves me right to be crippled in this fashion!” he cried. “It all results from my making such a fool of myself the other day, after that goat on the plateau. I ought to have known better.”“You need not vex yourself, brother, about that,” said Eric. “If there were twenty of us to get the boat into the water, instead of two, she could not live in the heavy sea that is now running. She would be swamped by the first roller that came in upon us, for the wind is blowing dead on shore!”“That may be,” replied Fritz; “still, I should like to do something, even if I knew it would be useless!”“So should I,” said Eric, disconsolately.In silence, the two continued to pace up and down the little platform they had levelled in front of their hut, trying to pierce the darkness that now entirely obscured the sea, the north-easter having brought up a thick fog in its train, perhaps from the far-distant African coast, which shut out everything on that side; although, the light of the bonfire still illumined the cliff encircling the valley where they had pitched their homestead, disclosing the inmost recesses of this, so that they could see from where they stood, the wood, which the conflagration had spared, as well as their garden and the tussock-grass rookery of the penguins beyond, not a feature of the landscape being hid.Again came the booming, melancholy sound of the minute guns from sea, making the brothers more impatient than ever; and, at that moment, the fog suddenly lifted, being rapidly wafted away to leeward over the island, enabling the two anxious watchers to see a bit of bright sky overhead, with a twinkling star or two looking down on the raging ocean, now exposed to their gaze—all covered with rolling breakers and seething foam as far as the eye could reach, to the furthest confines of the horizon beyond the bay.Still, they could perceive nothing of the ship that had been firing the signals of distress, till, all at once, another gun was heard; and the flash, which caught their glance at the same moment as the report reached them, now enabled them to notice her imminent peril. This, the people on board could only then have noticed for the first time, the fog having previously concealed their danger; for they distinctly heard, above the noise of the sea and wind, a hoarse shout of agonised, frantic alarm, wafted shorewards by the wind in one of its wild gusts.The vessel was coming up under close-reefed topsails, bow on to the headland on the western side of the bay; and, almost at the very instant the brothers saw her, she struck with a crash on the rocks, the surf rushing up the steep face of the cliff and falling back on the deck of the ill-fated craft in sheets of spray like soapsuds.Fritz and Eric clasped their hands in mute supplication to heaven; but, at the same moment, the spars of the vessel—she was a brig, they could see—fell over her side with a crash. There was a grinding and rending of timbers; and then, one enormous wave, as of three billows rolled into one, poured over her in a cataract.One concentrated shriek of horror and agony came from the seething whirlpool of broken water, and, all was over; for, when the foam had washed away with the retreating wave, not a single vestige could be seen of the hapless craft!She had sunk below the sea with those on board.“Oh, brother, it is awful!” cried Eric.Fritz could not answer. His throat was filled with a great gulping lump which prevented him from drawing his breath; while his eyes were suffused with tears that no unmanly feelings had called forth.Eric was starting off again down to the beach, to see whether any one had escaped from the wreck and been swept into the bay, in which case he might have been of use in trying to drag them from the clutch of the cruel waves, when Fritz called him back.“Don’t leave me behind, brother,” he cried out passionately. “Wheel me down, in the barrow, so that I may help, too!”The lad stopped in a instant, comprehending his brother’s request; and, flying back, in and out of the hut as if he had been galvanised, he quickly placed the old door on top of the wheelbarrow as a sort of platform, with a mattress on top. He then lifted Fritz on the superstructure as if he were a child, the excitement having given him tenfold strength; and, wheeling the barrow down at a run, the two arrived on the beach almost sooner than a boat could have pulled ashore from the point where the catastrophe to the vessel had occurred.But, although it was now light enough to scan the surface of the restless sea for some distance out, no struggling form could be seen battling with the waves; nor was there a single fragment of the wreck noticeable, tossing about on the billows that still rolled in thunderingly on the beach, marking out the contour of the bay with a line of white surf, which shone out in contrast to the glittering black sand that was ever and anon displayed as the back-wash of the waves swept out again in a downward curve preparatory to the billows hurling themselves in shore once more with renewed force.“Poor chaps, they must all have gone down!” said Eric, half crying. He had made sure that some one would have escaped, if only for him to rescue at the last moment—perhaps just when the sinking swimmer might require a helping hand to drag him from the clutches of the grasping billows that sought to overwhelm him as he was getting beyond their reach!“There’s no doubt of that,” echoed Fritz, who had got off his platform on the wheelbarrow with much more agility than he had been capable of a short time before. “The sea has swallowed up those who were not dashed to pieces on the headland! I hardly know which fate was the least preferable of the two?”“I do hope that the bonfire did not lead to their misfortune,” said Eric presently. “If so, I should consider myself to be the cause of their death!”“No, I don’t think it was, laddie,” replied Fritz, to cheer him, the lad being greatly distressed at the thought of having occasioned the catastrophe. “You see, the ship must have been coming from the other side of the headland, whose height would shut all view of our valley entirely from the sea.”“Well, I only hope so,” replied Eric, only half consoled. “I’m afraid, however, the people on board took the flame of the burning grass to be some beacon to warn them.”“In that case, they would have kept away from it, of course,” said Fritz decidedly; “so, no blame can be attached to you. The wind, you see, was blowing a gale from the north-east; and, probably, they were driving on before it, never thinking they were near Inaccessible Island, nor believing that there was such a place anywhere within miles of them, or land at all, for that matter, till they should reach the South American coast!”“Perhaps so,” rejoined Eric, in a brighter tone; “but then, again, they might have thought the light to be a ship on fire, and, in going out of their way to lend assistance, they possibly met with their doom, eh?”“Ah, that would be sad to believe,” said Fritz. “However, I don’t think we should worry ourselves over the dispensations of providence. Poor fellows, whoever they are, or whatever they were about at the time of the disaster, I’m sorry for them from the bottom of my heart!”“And so am I,” chimed in his brother. “But now, old fellow,” added Eric, “it is time for you to be getting back indoors, with your poor back and wounded leg.”“Yes, I shan’t be sorry to lie down now; for, I’ve exerted myself more than I should have done. Oh,” continued Fritz, as the lad helped him on to the wheelbarrow platform, again preparing to return to the hut, “I shall never forget the sight of that doomed vessel dashing against the rocks. I fancy I can now see the whole hideous panorama before my eyes again, just as we saw it when the mist cleared away, disclosing all the horrors of the scene!”“I shan’t forget it either, brother,” said Eric, as he commenced to wheel back Fritz homeward, neither uttering another word on the way.Both went to bed sadly enough; for, the calamity that had just occurred before their eyes made them more depressed than they had ever been before—aye, even in the solitude of their first night alone on the island.Next morning, the gale had blown itself out, the wind having toned down to a gentle breeze; while the sea was smiling in the sunshine, so innocently that it seemed impossible it could have been lashed into the fury it exhibited the previous night. There it was, rippling and prattling away on the beach in the most light-hearted fashion, oblivious, apparently, of all thought of evil!All trace of the wreck, too, had disappeared, nothing being subsequently cast ashore but one single plank, on which the hieroglyphic letters, “PF Bordeaux,” were carved rudely with a chisel; so, the mystery of the brig’s name and destination remained unsolved to the brothers, as it probably will continue a mystery, until that day when the ocean gives up its secrets and yields up its dead to life!
“Himmel!” exclaimed Fritz, rising up from the bench on which he was sitting and clutching on to the side of the hut for support, being still very feeble and hardly able to stand upright. “There must be a ship out there approaching the island. If she should get too close inshore, she is doomed!”
But, Eric did not answer him. The lad had already rushed down to the beach; and, climbing on to a projecting boulder, was peering into the offing, endeavouring to make out the vessel whose signal gun had been heard in the distance.
The darkness, however, was too great. The heavens were overcast with thick, drifting clouds, while the sea below was as black as ink—except where the breakers at the base of the cliffs broke in masses of foam that gave out a sort of phosphorescent light for the moment, lighting up the outlines of the headlands during the brief interval, only for them to be swallowed up the next instant in the sombre gloom that enwrapped the bay and surrounding scene. Eric, consequently, could see nothing beyond the wall of heaving water which the rollers presented as they thundered on the shingle, dragging back the pebbles in their back-wash with a rattling noise, as if the spirits of the deep were playing with dice in the depths below under the waves!
At his back, the lad could see the bonfire still blazing, casting the foreground in all the deeper shadow from its flickering light; and, never did he regret anything more in his life than the sudden impulse which had led him into so dangerous a freak, as that of lighting the bonfire.
Who knew what further terrible peril that treacherous fire might not lead to, besides the mischief it had already done?
Bye-and-bye, there came the sound of another gun from the sea. The report sounded nearer this time; still, Eric could see nothing in sight on the horizon when some break in the clouds allowed him a momentary glimpse of the angry ocean—nothing but the huge billows chasing each other in towards the land and the seething foam at the base of the crags, on which they broke themselves in impotent fury when they found their further course arrested by the rocky ramparts of the island.
Nor could the lad hear anything beyond the crash of the breakers and splash of the eddying water, which sometimes washed up to his feet, as he stood on the boulder gazing out vainly to sea, the sound of the breaking billows being mingled with the shriek of the wind as it whistled by overhead.
Nothing but the tumult of the sea, stirred into frenzy by the storm-blast of angry Aeolus!
After a time, Eric suddenly recollected that his brother could not move far from the hut and must be wondering what had become of him; and, recognising as well the fact that he was powerless alone to do anything where he was, even if a ship should be in danger, he returned towards the cottage to rejoin Fritz, his path up the valley being lit up quite clearly by the expiring bonfire, which still flamed out every now and then, as the wind fanned it in its mad rush up the gorge, stirring out the embers into an occasional flash of brilliancy.
Fritz, usually so calm, was in a terribly anxious state when his brother reached him.
“Well, have you seen anything?” he asked impatiently.
“No,” said Eric sorrowfully. “There’s nothing to be seen.”
“Butyouheard another cannon, did you not?”
“Oh yes, and it seemed closer in.”
“So I thought, too,” said the other, whom the sound of the heavy guns, from his old experience in war, appeared to affect like a stimulant. “Can’t we do anything? It is terrible to stand idly here and allow our fellow-creatures to perish, without trying to save them!”
“What could we do?” asked Eric helplessly, all the buoyancy gone out of him. He seemed to be quite another lad.
“You couldn’t launch the boat without me, eh?”
“No,” answered Eric; “I couldn’t move it off the beach with all my strength—I tried just now.”
Fritz ground his teeth in rage at his invalid condition.
“It serves me right to be crippled in this fashion!” he cried. “It all results from my making such a fool of myself the other day, after that goat on the plateau. I ought to have known better.”
“You need not vex yourself, brother, about that,” said Eric. “If there were twenty of us to get the boat into the water, instead of two, she could not live in the heavy sea that is now running. She would be swamped by the first roller that came in upon us, for the wind is blowing dead on shore!”
“That may be,” replied Fritz; “still, I should like to do something, even if I knew it would be useless!”
“So should I,” said Eric, disconsolately.
In silence, the two continued to pace up and down the little platform they had levelled in front of their hut, trying to pierce the darkness that now entirely obscured the sea, the north-easter having brought up a thick fog in its train, perhaps from the far-distant African coast, which shut out everything on that side; although, the light of the bonfire still illumined the cliff encircling the valley where they had pitched their homestead, disclosing the inmost recesses of this, so that they could see from where they stood, the wood, which the conflagration had spared, as well as their garden and the tussock-grass rookery of the penguins beyond, not a feature of the landscape being hid.
Again came the booming, melancholy sound of the minute guns from sea, making the brothers more impatient than ever; and, at that moment, the fog suddenly lifted, being rapidly wafted away to leeward over the island, enabling the two anxious watchers to see a bit of bright sky overhead, with a twinkling star or two looking down on the raging ocean, now exposed to their gaze—all covered with rolling breakers and seething foam as far as the eye could reach, to the furthest confines of the horizon beyond the bay.
Still, they could perceive nothing of the ship that had been firing the signals of distress, till, all at once, another gun was heard; and the flash, which caught their glance at the same moment as the report reached them, now enabled them to notice her imminent peril. This, the people on board could only then have noticed for the first time, the fog having previously concealed their danger; for they distinctly heard, above the noise of the sea and wind, a hoarse shout of agonised, frantic alarm, wafted shorewards by the wind in one of its wild gusts.
The vessel was coming up under close-reefed topsails, bow on to the headland on the western side of the bay; and, almost at the very instant the brothers saw her, she struck with a crash on the rocks, the surf rushing up the steep face of the cliff and falling back on the deck of the ill-fated craft in sheets of spray like soapsuds.
Fritz and Eric clasped their hands in mute supplication to heaven; but, at the same moment, the spars of the vessel—she was a brig, they could see—fell over her side with a crash. There was a grinding and rending of timbers; and then, one enormous wave, as of three billows rolled into one, poured over her in a cataract.
One concentrated shriek of horror and agony came from the seething whirlpool of broken water, and, all was over; for, when the foam had washed away with the retreating wave, not a single vestige could be seen of the hapless craft!
She had sunk below the sea with those on board.
“Oh, brother, it is awful!” cried Eric.
Fritz could not answer. His throat was filled with a great gulping lump which prevented him from drawing his breath; while his eyes were suffused with tears that no unmanly feelings had called forth.
Eric was starting off again down to the beach, to see whether any one had escaped from the wreck and been swept into the bay, in which case he might have been of use in trying to drag them from the clutch of the cruel waves, when Fritz called him back.
“Don’t leave me behind, brother,” he cried out passionately. “Wheel me down, in the barrow, so that I may help, too!”
The lad stopped in a instant, comprehending his brother’s request; and, flying back, in and out of the hut as if he had been galvanised, he quickly placed the old door on top of the wheelbarrow as a sort of platform, with a mattress on top. He then lifted Fritz on the superstructure as if he were a child, the excitement having given him tenfold strength; and, wheeling the barrow down at a run, the two arrived on the beach almost sooner than a boat could have pulled ashore from the point where the catastrophe to the vessel had occurred.
But, although it was now light enough to scan the surface of the restless sea for some distance out, no struggling form could be seen battling with the waves; nor was there a single fragment of the wreck noticeable, tossing about on the billows that still rolled in thunderingly on the beach, marking out the contour of the bay with a line of white surf, which shone out in contrast to the glittering black sand that was ever and anon displayed as the back-wash of the waves swept out again in a downward curve preparatory to the billows hurling themselves in shore once more with renewed force.
“Poor chaps, they must all have gone down!” said Eric, half crying. He had made sure that some one would have escaped, if only for him to rescue at the last moment—perhaps just when the sinking swimmer might require a helping hand to drag him from the clutches of the grasping billows that sought to overwhelm him as he was getting beyond their reach!
“There’s no doubt of that,” echoed Fritz, who had got off his platform on the wheelbarrow with much more agility than he had been capable of a short time before. “The sea has swallowed up those who were not dashed to pieces on the headland! I hardly know which fate was the least preferable of the two?”
“I do hope that the bonfire did not lead to their misfortune,” said Eric presently. “If so, I should consider myself to be the cause of their death!”
“No, I don’t think it was, laddie,” replied Fritz, to cheer him, the lad being greatly distressed at the thought of having occasioned the catastrophe. “You see, the ship must have been coming from the other side of the headland, whose height would shut all view of our valley entirely from the sea.”
“Well, I only hope so,” replied Eric, only half consoled. “I’m afraid, however, the people on board took the flame of the burning grass to be some beacon to warn them.”
“In that case, they would have kept away from it, of course,” said Fritz decidedly; “so, no blame can be attached to you. The wind, you see, was blowing a gale from the north-east; and, probably, they were driving on before it, never thinking they were near Inaccessible Island, nor believing that there was such a place anywhere within miles of them, or land at all, for that matter, till they should reach the South American coast!”
“Perhaps so,” rejoined Eric, in a brighter tone; “but then, again, they might have thought the light to be a ship on fire, and, in going out of their way to lend assistance, they possibly met with their doom, eh?”
“Ah, that would be sad to believe,” said Fritz. “However, I don’t think we should worry ourselves over the dispensations of providence. Poor fellows, whoever they are, or whatever they were about at the time of the disaster, I’m sorry for them from the bottom of my heart!”
“And so am I,” chimed in his brother. “But now, old fellow,” added Eric, “it is time for you to be getting back indoors, with your poor back and wounded leg.”
“Yes, I shan’t be sorry to lie down now; for, I’ve exerted myself more than I should have done. Oh,” continued Fritz, as the lad helped him on to the wheelbarrow platform, again preparing to return to the hut, “I shall never forget the sight of that doomed vessel dashing against the rocks. I fancy I can now see the whole hideous panorama before my eyes again, just as we saw it when the mist cleared away, disclosing all the horrors of the scene!”
“I shan’t forget it either, brother,” said Eric, as he commenced to wheel back Fritz homeward, neither uttering another word on the way.
Both went to bed sadly enough; for, the calamity that had just occurred before their eyes made them more depressed than they had ever been before—aye, even in the solitude of their first night alone on the island.
Next morning, the gale had blown itself out, the wind having toned down to a gentle breeze; while the sea was smiling in the sunshine, so innocently that it seemed impossible it could have been lashed into the fury it exhibited the previous night. There it was, rippling and prattling away on the beach in the most light-hearted fashion, oblivious, apparently, of all thought of evil!
All trace of the wreck, too, had disappeared, nothing being subsequently cast ashore but one single plank, on which the hieroglyphic letters, “PF Bordeaux,” were carved rudely with a chisel; so, the mystery of the brig’s name and destination remained unsolved to the brothers, as it probably will continue a mystery, until that day when the ocean gives up its secrets and yields up its dead to life!
Chapter Thirty Two.“News from Home.”For some time after the wreck, the brothers seemed to experience a strange dreariness about the place which they never felt before.They were now shut in entirely, being confined, as it were, to the little valley of the waterfall through the destruction of the tussock-grass ladder, which previously had opened the tableland on top of the crags to them, giving greater liberty of action; although the ascent had not been by any means an easy matter for Fritz.Now, however, restricted to their scanty domain, bounded by the bare cliff at the back and encompassed by lofty headlands on either side, they were prevented from wandering beyond the limits of the bay, save by taking to their boat; and this, the strong winds which set in at the latter end of March rendered utterly impossible of achievement.Consequently, they began to realise more fully their solitary condition, recognising the fact that they were crusoes indeed!No event of any importance happened after the episode of the bonfire and the storm in which the crew of the brig perished, for some weeks, nothing occurring to break the monotony of the solitary life they were leading; until, one morning, without any warning, the penguins, which had been their constant companions from the commencement of their self-chosen exile up to now, suddenly left the island.This was in the month of April.Never was a migration more unexpected.On the evening before, the birds, so long as daylight lasted, were seen still playing about in the bay and arranging themselves in lines along the rough escarpment of the headlands, where they were drawn up like soldiers on parade and apparently dressed in the old-fashioned uniform that is sometimes still seen on the stage. Really, their black and white plumage exactly resembled the white buckskin breeches and black three-cornered hats of the whilom mousquetaires; while their drooping flappers seemed like hands down their sides in the attitude of “attention!”—the upper portions of the wings, projecting in front, representing those horrible cross-belts that used to make the men look as if they wore stays.The penguins seemed so much at home on the island that it looked as if they never intended leaving it, albeit the brothers noticed that the birds barked and grumbled more discordantly than they had done of late. No doubt there was something on hand, they thought; but they never dreamt that this grand pow-wow was their leave-taking of the rookery; but, lo and behold! when Eric came out of the hut next morning to pay his customary matutinal visit to the beach, there was not a single penguin to be seen anywhere in the vicinity, either out in the water or on land!They had disappeared, as if by magic, in one single night. In the evening before, they were with them; when day dawned, they were gone!Fritz and Eric had got so accustomed to the birds by this time, studying their habits and watching the progress of many of the adult penguins from the egg to representative birdom, as they passed through the various gradations of hatching and moulting, that they quite missed them for the first few days after their departure.The cliffs, without their presence to enliven them, appeared never so stern and bleak and bare as now; the headlands never so forbidding and impassable; the valley never so prison-like, to the brothers, shut in as they were and confined to the bay!However, the winter season coming on apace, the two soon had plenty to do in preparing for its advent. This served to distract their attention from becoming morbid and dwelling on their loneliness, which was all the more dismal now from the fact of their being debarred from their hunting-ground on the plateau—Fritz having got strong and well again after the wreck, and being now able to start on a second expedition in pursuit of “Kaiser Billy,” did he so wish, if the access to the tableland above the cliffs by way of the gully were only still open to them.Goat-shooting, therefore, being denied them, the brothers busied themselves about other matters, as soon as the increasing coldness of the air and an occasional snow-storm warned them that winter would soon visit the shores of the island.“I tell you what,” said Fritz, when the first few flakes of snow came fluttering down one afternoon as they were standing outside the hut, the sun having set early and darkness coming on. “We’re going to have some of the old weather we were accustomed to at Lubeck.”“Ah; but, we can have no skating or slides here!” replied Eric, thinking of the canals and frozen surface of the sea near his northern home, when the frost asserted its sway, ruling with a sceptre of ice everywhere.“No, and we don’t want them either,” rejoined the practical Fritz. “I am pondering over a much more serious matter; and that is, how we shall keep ourselves warm? My coat, unfortunately, is getting pretty nearly worn-out!”“And so is mine,” cried Eric, exhibiting the elbows of his reefing jacket, in which a couple of large holes showed themselves. The rest of the garment, also, was so patched up with pieces of different coloured cloth that it more resembled an old-clothes-man’s sack than anything else!“Well, what do you think of our paying our tailor a visit?” said Fritz all at once, after cogitating a while in a brown study.Eric burst out into a loud fit of laughing; so hearty that he nearly doubled himself up in the paroxysms of his mirth.“Ha, ha, ha, what a funny fellow you are, Fritz!” he exclaimed. “I wonder where we are going to find a tailor here?”“Oh, I know one,” said his brother coolly, in such a matter-of-fact way that the lad was quite staggered with surprise.“Do you?” he asked in astonishment. “Who is he?”“Your humble servant,” said Fritz, with a low bow. “Can I have the pleasure of measuring you for a new suit, meinherr?”Eric began laughing again.“You can measure away to your heart’s content,” he replied; “but, I fancy it will puzzle even your lofty intellect to discover the wherewithal to make clothes with—that is, except sailcloth, which would be rather cold wear for winter, I think, eh, Master Schneider?”“How about those two last sealskins we didn’t salt down, or pack up with the rest in the puncheon?” enquired Fritz with a smile.“O–oh!” exclaimed Eric, opening his mouth wide with wonder.“A–ah,” rejoined his brother. “I think they’ll do very well to make a couple of good coats for us; they’ll be warm and serviceable.”“Of course they will,” said Eric, jumping at the idea. “And, they will be fashionable too! Why, sealskin jackets are all the rage in Berlin and Hanover; so, we’ll be regular dandies!”“Dandies of the first water, oh yes,” replied Fritz quizzingly. “I wonder what they would think of us at, Lubeck if they could just see us now!”“Never mind, brother, we’ll astonish them when we go back with our pockets full of money,” said Eric in his happy fashion; and then, without further delay, the two set to work making themselves winter garments, as Fritz had suggested, from the sealskins.These had been dried, instead of being salted down with the rest, in the ordinary way whalers preserve them for the furriers; so, now, all that remained for the brothers to do was to make the skins limp and pliable.This they managed to effect by rubbing grease over the inner surface of the skins with a hard piece of lava slab selected from the volcanic débris at the foot of the cliff, in the same way, as Eric explained, that sailors holystone the decks of a ship; and, after the pelts of the seals were subjected to this process, they underwent a species of tanning by being steeped in a decoction of tea leaves, keeping, however, the hair out of the liquor. Lastly, the outside portion of the skins was dressed by pulling off the long fibrous exterior hairs, concealing the soft fur below that resembled the down beneath a bird’s rough feathers.The skins being now thoroughly prepared, all that remained to do was to cut out the coats, a feat the crusoes accomplished by using their old garments for patterns; and then, by the aid of the useful little housewife which Celia Brown had given Eric, after an immense amount of stitching, the brothers were able at last to clothe themselves in a couple of fur jackets. These, although they were perhaps roughly made, the good people at home could not have turned up their noses at, for the articles were certainly intrinsically worth more than the best-cut masterpiece of the best outfitter, even if not of so perfect a fit or style!Fritz was the chief tailor in this operation; but, while he was busily engaged with needle and thread, Eric was employed in another way, equally for the good of both.The hut had been found somewhat cold and damp in consequence of the sun’s power beginning to wane by reason of its shifting further north, through the periodic revolution of the earth; so it was determined to build a fireplace within the dwelling.This had not been necessary before, all their cooking operations having been carried on without the hut at an open-air campaigner’s stove designed by soldier Fritz.Now, however, Master Eric devoted himself to the task of improving their household economy, accomplishing the feat so well that, wonderful to relate, the place never smoked once after the fire had been lit in the new receptacle for it, excepting when the wind blew from the westward. Then, indeed, coming from over the top of the plateau above, it whirled down the gorge, roaring through the lad’s patent chimney like a cyclone.From May, until the end of July—during which time the extreme severity of the winter lasted—the brothers did little, save stop indoors and read, or play dominoes.Really, there was nothing else for them to occupy their minds with; for, it was impossible to cultivate the garden, while the weather was too rough for them to venture out in the whale-boat.Early in August, however, the penguins returned.The birds did this as suddenly as they had left; although they did not come all together, as at the period of their migrating from the island.It need hardly be said that Fritz and Eric welcomed them joyfully as the early swallows of the coming summer; for, as the summer advanced, their life would be more varied, and there would be plenty for them to do.Besides, the brothers had not forgotten Captain Brown’s promise to return at this period and visit them with thePilot’s Bride, the arrival of which vessel might be expected in a couple of months or so.The male penguins were the first to make their reappearance in the bay, Eric returning to the hut with the news of this fact one morning in August.“I say, Fritz,” he called out, when yet some distance off from their dwelling—“I’ve just seen two penguins down by the sea!”“Have you?” exclaimed the other eagerly. “That’s good news.”“Is it?” said Eric. “I didn’t think you cared about them so much.”“Ah, I’m looking out for their eggs,” replied Fritz.“Why, you never seemed to fancy them last year, old fellow,” said the sailor lad surprised. “What means this change of view on your part?”“Well, you know, when we arrived here first, the birds were already sitting; and, I certainly confess I did not care about the eggs then, for they would probably have been half addled! Now, however, if we look out each day, we can get them quite fresh, when they’ll be ever so much better. Young Glass told us, as you ought to remember, that they tasted very nice and not in the least fishy.”“Oh, yes, I recollect,” said Eric. “I will keep a good look-out for them now you say they’re worth looking after!”And he did.The two male birds, who first came, were succeeded on the following day by half a dozen more, a large number coming later on the same afternoon.All these penguins were in their best plumage, and very fat and lazy, contenting themselves with lolling about the beach for a day or two, as if to recover from the fatigues of their journey.Then, after a solemn conference together close to the rookery, the birds began to prepare their nests, so as to be ready for the reception of the females, which did not make their appearance for nearly a month after the first male penguins were seen.A fortnight later, there was in almost each nest an egg of a pale blue colour, very round in shape and about the size of a turkey’s—the sight of which much gratified Master Eric, who, fearless of consequences, made a point of investigating the tussock-grass colony every morning. He called the birds habitat his “poultry yard,” seeming to be quite unmindful of his mishap there the previous year; although now, as the penguins had not begun regularly to sit yet, they were not so noisy or troublesome as when he then intruded on their domain. Besides, as the sailor lad argued, the eggs were uncommonly good eating, and well worth risk getting them.September came; and the brother crusoes were all agog with excitement, watching for the expected coming of the old Yankee skipper.“Do you know what to-day is?” asked Fritz one morning, as Eric woke him up in turning out.“What a fellow you are for dates!” exclaimed the other. “You ought to go and live in the East, where they cultivate them, brother! No, I can’t say I recollect what day it is. Tuesday, is it not?”“I don’t mean that,” said Fritz petulantly. “I alluded to the sort of anniversary, that’s all.”“Anniversary of what?”“Our landing here last year,” replied Fritz.“Oh, I forgot that!” exclaimed Eric.“It strikes me you forget a good many things,” said his brother in his dry way. “Still, what I was thinking of was, that we might now really begin to look out for Captain Brown. What a pity it is that you can’t ascend to your old signalling station on top of the gully.”“Yes, it was all on account of the grass burning that our ladder got spoilt and—”“Of course you didn’t set it on fire, eh?” interposed Fritz.“Ah well, it’s of no use our talking about that now; words will not mend matters,” said Eric. “We’ll have look out from here!”The wind latterly had been from the east, blowing right into the bay. On account of this, the brothers could not venture out in the boat and thus get round the headland, so as to climb the plateau from the other side of the island and scan the offing from thence.Still, no amount of looking out on their part—or lack of observation, whichever way the matter was put—seemed to effect the arrival of the expected ship; for, the month passed away in daily counted days without a trace of a sail being seen on the horizon.At last, just when the brothers had given up in despair all hope of hearing from home, Eric, one morning in October, reported that there was something in sight to windward of the bay; although, he said, he did not think she looked like thePilot’s Bride.Hastily jumping into his clothes—for Fritz, sad to relate, could never practise early rising, in which good habit day after day Eric set him a praiseworthy example—the elder followed the younger lad again to the shore of the bay; from which point, well away out to sea, and her hull just rising from the rolling plane of water, could be seen a vessel. She was steering for the island apparently, with the wind well on her beam.“It isn’t Captain Brown’s ship,” said Eric now decisively, his sailor eye having distinguished while she was yet in the distance that the vessel was a fore-and-aft-rigged schooner, although Fritz could not then tell what sort of craft she was. “It is one of those small whalers that ply amongst the islands, such as I saw down at Kerguelen.”“What can have become of the skipper, then?” cried Fritz, quite disappointed. “I hope nothing has happened to him.”“We’ll soon know,” replied Eric. “If I mistake not this very schooner, which is evidently going to call here, is theJane. I know her by that queer patch in her jib; and, if that’s the case, she is one of the consorts of thePilot’s Brideand will be bound to be able to tell us something about her.”“I sincerely hope so,” said Fritz.The two then remained silent for some time, watching the approaching vessel; but they took the precaution to run down their whale-boat to the beach, so as to be ready to put off as soon as the visitor should come near enough for them to board her.In a short time, bowling up before a good breeze, although it seemed hours to them, they were so anxious, the schooner lay-to off the bay, hoisting her flag as a signal that she wished to communicate. But, long before the bunting had been run up to the masthead, the brothers had launched their boat and were pulling out towards the vessel, which did not anchor, for there was a heavy ground swell on—this latter, indeed, cost them, too, some trouble in getting their little craft out to sea, the rolling surge first lifting her up and then plunging her down so that everything was hidden from them for the moment by a wall of water on either side.However, they managed to get through the waves somehow; and, presently, they were alongside the schooner,—pulling in under her stern, whence a rope was hove them to get on board by.An active-looking, slim, seamanlike young fellow advanced to them as they scrambled on the schooner’s deck; and Eric appeared to recognise him.“Hullo, Captain Fuller,” he said, “where’s thePilot’s Brideand the old skipper?”“I’m sorry you won’t see him this trip,” replied the other. “The barque got damaged in a gale off the African coast a month ago: so, she had to put into the Cape of Good Hope for repairs, which’ll take such a time that Captain Brown couldn’t manage to come along here and see you as he promised. Howsomever, the old skipper has sent me in his stead, to bring you some letters and take home any cargo you might have ready in sealskins and oil. He told me, likewise, to let you have any provisions you may want; but, I’m sorry to say, while coming here I helped an American ship that was short, and now I only have a little flour left to spare.”“Thank you, all the same,” said Fritz, who had been waiting patiently while the master of the schooner gave this explanation. “I’m very sorry at not seeing Captain Brown; however, I suppose he’ll come for us next year, as he said, won’t he?”“Oh yes,” answered the other cordially. “I’m sure he will, for it seemed a great disappointment to him not to be able to do so now. He told me to be certain to say that, ‘blow great guns and small arms or not, he’ll be at Inaccessible Island next year!’ But, you must be anxious about your letters. Here they are,” and the nice-looking young fellow, whom Fritz had quite taken a fancy to, handed a little packet to him, adding, “I am afraid I’ll have to hurry you up about your return messages, as the wind is getting up from the eastwards and I shan’t be able to remain here long.”Fritz at once broke the seal of a thick letter, which Captain Brown had enclosed in one of his own. This he saw came from Lubeck, although it had the Capetown post mark on it, and he glanced hurriedly over the front page and then at the end.“All right at home, thank God!” he said aloud for Eric’s benefit, the lad staring at his brother with eager eyes. “And now, Captain Fuller, I’m ready to attend to you. I shall be glad of a barrel of flour if you can spare it, but our other provisions can hold out. Will you let a man or two come ashore to help get our freight aboard?”“How much have you got to ship?” asked the other.“Thirty sealskins and twenty barrels of oil,” replied Fritz at once; he and Eric had counted over their little store too often for him not to have their tally at his fingers’ ends!“Come now,” said Captain Fuller encouragingly. “That’s not bad work for a couple of novices as their first take here! Next year, you’ll be able to fill up thePilot’s Bride, ‘I reckon,’ as the old skipper would say.”“Not quite that,” replied Fritz, while he and Eric joined in the other’s laugh; “still, I’ve no doubt we’ll do better than this, for we’ll take care to be beforehand with some folks!”The commander of the schooner looking puzzled by the latter part of this speech, Fritz proceeded to tell the young seaman all about Nat Slater and the Tristaners, anent which he became very indignant.“I’ll take care to call at the island and spoil the mean fellow’s game for him, so that you shan’t be troubled in the same way again!” cried their new friend, with much heartiness; “but, do, please, let these men go ashore with you now and fetch your produce at once, or else we’ll have to be off without it! Here, Harris and Betkins,” he sang out to two of the schooner’s men, “go along with these gentlemen in their boat and bring off some cargo they’ll point out to you!”“I don’t think we can stow all in one boat,” said Eric.“Then, we must make two or three trips till we do,” answered the other, equal to the occasion; and this procedure was adopted until all the brothers’ sealskins and barrels of oils were shipped in the schooner. The goods were consigned to Captain Brown, who had undertaken to dispose of all the produce of their expedition; and, when the freight was all shipped, the schooner, filling her sails, bore away from the island on her return trip to the Cape—not without a hearty farewell to Fritz and Eric from those on board.This visit of the little craft cheered them up wonderfully, reconciling them cheerfully to another year’s sojourn in their island home; for, had not the schooner brought them comfort and hope, and, above all else, what was to their longing hearts like manna to the Israelites in the wilderness, water to a dry ground, warmth to those shivering with cold—in other words, “good news from home?”Aye, that she had!
For some time after the wreck, the brothers seemed to experience a strange dreariness about the place which they never felt before.
They were now shut in entirely, being confined, as it were, to the little valley of the waterfall through the destruction of the tussock-grass ladder, which previously had opened the tableland on top of the crags to them, giving greater liberty of action; although the ascent had not been by any means an easy matter for Fritz.
Now, however, restricted to their scanty domain, bounded by the bare cliff at the back and encompassed by lofty headlands on either side, they were prevented from wandering beyond the limits of the bay, save by taking to their boat; and this, the strong winds which set in at the latter end of March rendered utterly impossible of achievement.
Consequently, they began to realise more fully their solitary condition, recognising the fact that they were crusoes indeed!
No event of any importance happened after the episode of the bonfire and the storm in which the crew of the brig perished, for some weeks, nothing occurring to break the monotony of the solitary life they were leading; until, one morning, without any warning, the penguins, which had been their constant companions from the commencement of their self-chosen exile up to now, suddenly left the island.
This was in the month of April.
Never was a migration more unexpected.
On the evening before, the birds, so long as daylight lasted, were seen still playing about in the bay and arranging themselves in lines along the rough escarpment of the headlands, where they were drawn up like soldiers on parade and apparently dressed in the old-fashioned uniform that is sometimes still seen on the stage. Really, their black and white plumage exactly resembled the white buckskin breeches and black three-cornered hats of the whilom mousquetaires; while their drooping flappers seemed like hands down their sides in the attitude of “attention!”—the upper portions of the wings, projecting in front, representing those horrible cross-belts that used to make the men look as if they wore stays.
The penguins seemed so much at home on the island that it looked as if they never intended leaving it, albeit the brothers noticed that the birds barked and grumbled more discordantly than they had done of late. No doubt there was something on hand, they thought; but they never dreamt that this grand pow-wow was their leave-taking of the rookery; but, lo and behold! when Eric came out of the hut next morning to pay his customary matutinal visit to the beach, there was not a single penguin to be seen anywhere in the vicinity, either out in the water or on land!
They had disappeared, as if by magic, in one single night. In the evening before, they were with them; when day dawned, they were gone!
Fritz and Eric had got so accustomed to the birds by this time, studying their habits and watching the progress of many of the adult penguins from the egg to representative birdom, as they passed through the various gradations of hatching and moulting, that they quite missed them for the first few days after their departure.
The cliffs, without their presence to enliven them, appeared never so stern and bleak and bare as now; the headlands never so forbidding and impassable; the valley never so prison-like, to the brothers, shut in as they were and confined to the bay!
However, the winter season coming on apace, the two soon had plenty to do in preparing for its advent. This served to distract their attention from becoming morbid and dwelling on their loneliness, which was all the more dismal now from the fact of their being debarred from their hunting-ground on the plateau—Fritz having got strong and well again after the wreck, and being now able to start on a second expedition in pursuit of “Kaiser Billy,” did he so wish, if the access to the tableland above the cliffs by way of the gully were only still open to them.
Goat-shooting, therefore, being denied them, the brothers busied themselves about other matters, as soon as the increasing coldness of the air and an occasional snow-storm warned them that winter would soon visit the shores of the island.
“I tell you what,” said Fritz, when the first few flakes of snow came fluttering down one afternoon as they were standing outside the hut, the sun having set early and darkness coming on. “We’re going to have some of the old weather we were accustomed to at Lubeck.”
“Ah; but, we can have no skating or slides here!” replied Eric, thinking of the canals and frozen surface of the sea near his northern home, when the frost asserted its sway, ruling with a sceptre of ice everywhere.
“No, and we don’t want them either,” rejoined the practical Fritz. “I am pondering over a much more serious matter; and that is, how we shall keep ourselves warm? My coat, unfortunately, is getting pretty nearly worn-out!”
“And so is mine,” cried Eric, exhibiting the elbows of his reefing jacket, in which a couple of large holes showed themselves. The rest of the garment, also, was so patched up with pieces of different coloured cloth that it more resembled an old-clothes-man’s sack than anything else!
“Well, what do you think of our paying our tailor a visit?” said Fritz all at once, after cogitating a while in a brown study.
Eric burst out into a loud fit of laughing; so hearty that he nearly doubled himself up in the paroxysms of his mirth.
“Ha, ha, ha, what a funny fellow you are, Fritz!” he exclaimed. “I wonder where we are going to find a tailor here?”
“Oh, I know one,” said his brother coolly, in such a matter-of-fact way that the lad was quite staggered with surprise.
“Do you?” he asked in astonishment. “Who is he?”
“Your humble servant,” said Fritz, with a low bow. “Can I have the pleasure of measuring you for a new suit, meinherr?”
Eric began laughing again.
“You can measure away to your heart’s content,” he replied; “but, I fancy it will puzzle even your lofty intellect to discover the wherewithal to make clothes with—that is, except sailcloth, which would be rather cold wear for winter, I think, eh, Master Schneider?”
“How about those two last sealskins we didn’t salt down, or pack up with the rest in the puncheon?” enquired Fritz with a smile.
“O–oh!” exclaimed Eric, opening his mouth wide with wonder.
“A–ah,” rejoined his brother. “I think they’ll do very well to make a couple of good coats for us; they’ll be warm and serviceable.”
“Of course they will,” said Eric, jumping at the idea. “And, they will be fashionable too! Why, sealskin jackets are all the rage in Berlin and Hanover; so, we’ll be regular dandies!”
“Dandies of the first water, oh yes,” replied Fritz quizzingly. “I wonder what they would think of us at, Lubeck if they could just see us now!”
“Never mind, brother, we’ll astonish them when we go back with our pockets full of money,” said Eric in his happy fashion; and then, without further delay, the two set to work making themselves winter garments, as Fritz had suggested, from the sealskins.
These had been dried, instead of being salted down with the rest, in the ordinary way whalers preserve them for the furriers; so, now, all that remained for the brothers to do was to make the skins limp and pliable.
This they managed to effect by rubbing grease over the inner surface of the skins with a hard piece of lava slab selected from the volcanic débris at the foot of the cliff, in the same way, as Eric explained, that sailors holystone the decks of a ship; and, after the pelts of the seals were subjected to this process, they underwent a species of tanning by being steeped in a decoction of tea leaves, keeping, however, the hair out of the liquor. Lastly, the outside portion of the skins was dressed by pulling off the long fibrous exterior hairs, concealing the soft fur below that resembled the down beneath a bird’s rough feathers.
The skins being now thoroughly prepared, all that remained to do was to cut out the coats, a feat the crusoes accomplished by using their old garments for patterns; and then, by the aid of the useful little housewife which Celia Brown had given Eric, after an immense amount of stitching, the brothers were able at last to clothe themselves in a couple of fur jackets. These, although they were perhaps roughly made, the good people at home could not have turned up their noses at, for the articles were certainly intrinsically worth more than the best-cut masterpiece of the best outfitter, even if not of so perfect a fit or style!
Fritz was the chief tailor in this operation; but, while he was busily engaged with needle and thread, Eric was employed in another way, equally for the good of both.
The hut had been found somewhat cold and damp in consequence of the sun’s power beginning to wane by reason of its shifting further north, through the periodic revolution of the earth; so it was determined to build a fireplace within the dwelling.
This had not been necessary before, all their cooking operations having been carried on without the hut at an open-air campaigner’s stove designed by soldier Fritz.
Now, however, Master Eric devoted himself to the task of improving their household economy, accomplishing the feat so well that, wonderful to relate, the place never smoked once after the fire had been lit in the new receptacle for it, excepting when the wind blew from the westward. Then, indeed, coming from over the top of the plateau above, it whirled down the gorge, roaring through the lad’s patent chimney like a cyclone.
From May, until the end of July—during which time the extreme severity of the winter lasted—the brothers did little, save stop indoors and read, or play dominoes.
Really, there was nothing else for them to occupy their minds with; for, it was impossible to cultivate the garden, while the weather was too rough for them to venture out in the whale-boat.
Early in August, however, the penguins returned.
The birds did this as suddenly as they had left; although they did not come all together, as at the period of their migrating from the island.
It need hardly be said that Fritz and Eric welcomed them joyfully as the early swallows of the coming summer; for, as the summer advanced, their life would be more varied, and there would be plenty for them to do.
Besides, the brothers had not forgotten Captain Brown’s promise to return at this period and visit them with thePilot’s Bride, the arrival of which vessel might be expected in a couple of months or so.
The male penguins were the first to make their reappearance in the bay, Eric returning to the hut with the news of this fact one morning in August.
“I say, Fritz,” he called out, when yet some distance off from their dwelling—“I’ve just seen two penguins down by the sea!”
“Have you?” exclaimed the other eagerly. “That’s good news.”
“Is it?” said Eric. “I didn’t think you cared about them so much.”
“Ah, I’m looking out for their eggs,” replied Fritz.
“Why, you never seemed to fancy them last year, old fellow,” said the sailor lad surprised. “What means this change of view on your part?”
“Well, you know, when we arrived here first, the birds were already sitting; and, I certainly confess I did not care about the eggs then, for they would probably have been half addled! Now, however, if we look out each day, we can get them quite fresh, when they’ll be ever so much better. Young Glass told us, as you ought to remember, that they tasted very nice and not in the least fishy.”
“Oh, yes, I recollect,” said Eric. “I will keep a good look-out for them now you say they’re worth looking after!”
And he did.
The two male birds, who first came, were succeeded on the following day by half a dozen more, a large number coming later on the same afternoon.
All these penguins were in their best plumage, and very fat and lazy, contenting themselves with lolling about the beach for a day or two, as if to recover from the fatigues of their journey.
Then, after a solemn conference together close to the rookery, the birds began to prepare their nests, so as to be ready for the reception of the females, which did not make their appearance for nearly a month after the first male penguins were seen.
A fortnight later, there was in almost each nest an egg of a pale blue colour, very round in shape and about the size of a turkey’s—the sight of which much gratified Master Eric, who, fearless of consequences, made a point of investigating the tussock-grass colony every morning. He called the birds habitat his “poultry yard,” seeming to be quite unmindful of his mishap there the previous year; although now, as the penguins had not begun regularly to sit yet, they were not so noisy or troublesome as when he then intruded on their domain. Besides, as the sailor lad argued, the eggs were uncommonly good eating, and well worth risk getting them.
September came; and the brother crusoes were all agog with excitement, watching for the expected coming of the old Yankee skipper.
“Do you know what to-day is?” asked Fritz one morning, as Eric woke him up in turning out.
“What a fellow you are for dates!” exclaimed the other. “You ought to go and live in the East, where they cultivate them, brother! No, I can’t say I recollect what day it is. Tuesday, is it not?”
“I don’t mean that,” said Fritz petulantly. “I alluded to the sort of anniversary, that’s all.”
“Anniversary of what?”
“Our landing here last year,” replied Fritz.
“Oh, I forgot that!” exclaimed Eric.
“It strikes me you forget a good many things,” said his brother in his dry way. “Still, what I was thinking of was, that we might now really begin to look out for Captain Brown. What a pity it is that you can’t ascend to your old signalling station on top of the gully.”
“Yes, it was all on account of the grass burning that our ladder got spoilt and—”
“Of course you didn’t set it on fire, eh?” interposed Fritz.
“Ah well, it’s of no use our talking about that now; words will not mend matters,” said Eric. “We’ll have look out from here!”
The wind latterly had been from the east, blowing right into the bay. On account of this, the brothers could not venture out in the boat and thus get round the headland, so as to climb the plateau from the other side of the island and scan the offing from thence.
Still, no amount of looking out on their part—or lack of observation, whichever way the matter was put—seemed to effect the arrival of the expected ship; for, the month passed away in daily counted days without a trace of a sail being seen on the horizon.
At last, just when the brothers had given up in despair all hope of hearing from home, Eric, one morning in October, reported that there was something in sight to windward of the bay; although, he said, he did not think she looked like thePilot’s Bride.
Hastily jumping into his clothes—for Fritz, sad to relate, could never practise early rising, in which good habit day after day Eric set him a praiseworthy example—the elder followed the younger lad again to the shore of the bay; from which point, well away out to sea, and her hull just rising from the rolling plane of water, could be seen a vessel. She was steering for the island apparently, with the wind well on her beam.
“It isn’t Captain Brown’s ship,” said Eric now decisively, his sailor eye having distinguished while she was yet in the distance that the vessel was a fore-and-aft-rigged schooner, although Fritz could not then tell what sort of craft she was. “It is one of those small whalers that ply amongst the islands, such as I saw down at Kerguelen.”
“What can have become of the skipper, then?” cried Fritz, quite disappointed. “I hope nothing has happened to him.”
“We’ll soon know,” replied Eric. “If I mistake not this very schooner, which is evidently going to call here, is theJane. I know her by that queer patch in her jib; and, if that’s the case, she is one of the consorts of thePilot’s Brideand will be bound to be able to tell us something about her.”
“I sincerely hope so,” said Fritz.
The two then remained silent for some time, watching the approaching vessel; but they took the precaution to run down their whale-boat to the beach, so as to be ready to put off as soon as the visitor should come near enough for them to board her.
In a short time, bowling up before a good breeze, although it seemed hours to them, they were so anxious, the schooner lay-to off the bay, hoisting her flag as a signal that she wished to communicate. But, long before the bunting had been run up to the masthead, the brothers had launched their boat and were pulling out towards the vessel, which did not anchor, for there was a heavy ground swell on—this latter, indeed, cost them, too, some trouble in getting their little craft out to sea, the rolling surge first lifting her up and then plunging her down so that everything was hidden from them for the moment by a wall of water on either side.
However, they managed to get through the waves somehow; and, presently, they were alongside the schooner,—pulling in under her stern, whence a rope was hove them to get on board by.
An active-looking, slim, seamanlike young fellow advanced to them as they scrambled on the schooner’s deck; and Eric appeared to recognise him.
“Hullo, Captain Fuller,” he said, “where’s thePilot’s Brideand the old skipper?”
“I’m sorry you won’t see him this trip,” replied the other. “The barque got damaged in a gale off the African coast a month ago: so, she had to put into the Cape of Good Hope for repairs, which’ll take such a time that Captain Brown couldn’t manage to come along here and see you as he promised. Howsomever, the old skipper has sent me in his stead, to bring you some letters and take home any cargo you might have ready in sealskins and oil. He told me, likewise, to let you have any provisions you may want; but, I’m sorry to say, while coming here I helped an American ship that was short, and now I only have a little flour left to spare.”
“Thank you, all the same,” said Fritz, who had been waiting patiently while the master of the schooner gave this explanation. “I’m very sorry at not seeing Captain Brown; however, I suppose he’ll come for us next year, as he said, won’t he?”
“Oh yes,” answered the other cordially. “I’m sure he will, for it seemed a great disappointment to him not to be able to do so now. He told me to be certain to say that, ‘blow great guns and small arms or not, he’ll be at Inaccessible Island next year!’ But, you must be anxious about your letters. Here they are,” and the nice-looking young fellow, whom Fritz had quite taken a fancy to, handed a little packet to him, adding, “I am afraid I’ll have to hurry you up about your return messages, as the wind is getting up from the eastwards and I shan’t be able to remain here long.”
Fritz at once broke the seal of a thick letter, which Captain Brown had enclosed in one of his own. This he saw came from Lubeck, although it had the Capetown post mark on it, and he glanced hurriedly over the front page and then at the end.
“All right at home, thank God!” he said aloud for Eric’s benefit, the lad staring at his brother with eager eyes. “And now, Captain Fuller, I’m ready to attend to you. I shall be glad of a barrel of flour if you can spare it, but our other provisions can hold out. Will you let a man or two come ashore to help get our freight aboard?”
“How much have you got to ship?” asked the other.
“Thirty sealskins and twenty barrels of oil,” replied Fritz at once; he and Eric had counted over their little store too often for him not to have their tally at his fingers’ ends!
“Come now,” said Captain Fuller encouragingly. “That’s not bad work for a couple of novices as their first take here! Next year, you’ll be able to fill up thePilot’s Bride, ‘I reckon,’ as the old skipper would say.”
“Not quite that,” replied Fritz, while he and Eric joined in the other’s laugh; “still, I’ve no doubt we’ll do better than this, for we’ll take care to be beforehand with some folks!”
The commander of the schooner looking puzzled by the latter part of this speech, Fritz proceeded to tell the young seaman all about Nat Slater and the Tristaners, anent which he became very indignant.
“I’ll take care to call at the island and spoil the mean fellow’s game for him, so that you shan’t be troubled in the same way again!” cried their new friend, with much heartiness; “but, do, please, let these men go ashore with you now and fetch your produce at once, or else we’ll have to be off without it! Here, Harris and Betkins,” he sang out to two of the schooner’s men, “go along with these gentlemen in their boat and bring off some cargo they’ll point out to you!”
“I don’t think we can stow all in one boat,” said Eric.
“Then, we must make two or three trips till we do,” answered the other, equal to the occasion; and this procedure was adopted until all the brothers’ sealskins and barrels of oils were shipped in the schooner. The goods were consigned to Captain Brown, who had undertaken to dispose of all the produce of their expedition; and, when the freight was all shipped, the schooner, filling her sails, bore away from the island on her return trip to the Cape—not without a hearty farewell to Fritz and Eric from those on board.
This visit of the little craft cheered them up wonderfully, reconciling them cheerfully to another year’s sojourn in their island home; for, had not the schooner brought them comfort and hope, and, above all else, what was to their longing hearts like manna to the Israelites in the wilderness, water to a dry ground, warmth to those shivering with cold—in other words, “good news from home?”
Aye, that she had!