The next day Pauline and her brothers visited the wreck, and here new
difficulties met them, for although the vessel lay hard and fast on the
rocks, there was a belt of water between it and the main shore, which
was not only broad, but deep.
"I can easily swim it," said Dominick, beginning to pull off his coat.
"Dom," said Otto, solemnly, "sharks!"
"That's true, my boy, I won't risk it."
He put his coat on again, and turned to look for some drift-wood with
which to make a raft.
"There's sure to be some lying about, you know," he said, "for a wreck
could hardly take place without something or other in the way of spars
or wreckage being washed ashore."
"But don't you think," suggested Otto, "that the men whose graves we
have found may have used it all up?"
Otto was right. Not a scrap of timber or cordage of any kind was to be
found after a most diligent search, and they were about to give it up in
despair, when Pauline remembered the bay where they had been cast
ashore, and which we have described as being filled with wreckage.
In truth, this bay and the reef with its group of islands lay right in
the track of one of those great ocean currents which, as the reader
probably knows, are caused by the constant circulation of all the waters
of the sea between the equator and the poles. This grand and continuous
flow is caused by difference of temperature and density in sea-water at
different places. At the equator the water is warm, at the poles it is
cold. This alone would suffice to cause circulation--somewhat as water
circulates in a boiling pot--but other active agents are at work. The
Arctic and Antarctic snows freshen the sea-water as well as cool it,
while equatorial heat evaporates as well as warms it, and thus leaves a
superabundance of salt and lime behind. The grand ocean current thus
caused is broken up into smaller streams, and the courses of these are
fixed by the conformation of land--just as a river's flow is turned
right or left, and sometimes backward in eddies, by the form of its
banks and bottom. Trade winds, and the earth's motion on its axis,
still further modify the streams, both as to direction and force.
It was one of those currents, then, which flowed past the reef and
sometimes cast vessels and wreckage on its shores.
Hastening to the bay, they accordingly found enough of broken spars and
planks, to have made half a dozen rafts, twice the size of that required
to go off with to the wreck; so to work they went at once with eager
enthusiasm.
"Hold on!" shouted Dominick, after a few spars had been collected and
dragged up on the sand.
Otto and Pauline paused in their labour, and looked anxiously at their
brother, for his face wore a perplexed look.
"We have forgotten that it is impossible to shove a raft of any size,
big or little, through these huge breakers, so as to get it round the
point, to where the wreck lies."
"Well, then," cried Otto, with the ready assurance of ignorance, "we'll
just drag it overland to the wreck, and launch it there."
"But, Otto, you have not taken into consideration the fact that our raft
must be so large that, when finished, the dragging of it over rough
ground would require three or four horses instead of three human
beings."
"Well, then," returned the boy, "we'll make it small, just big enough to
carry one person, and then we'll be able to drag it overland, and can go
off to the wreck one at a time."
"Now, just think, brainless one," retorted Dominick; "suppose that I
were to go off first to the wreck, what then?"
"Why, then _I_ would go off next of course, and then Pina would follow,
and so we'd all get on board one at a time, and explore it together."
"Yes; but what would you come off on?"
"The raft, to be sure."
"But the raft, I have supposed, is with me at the wreck. It won't go
back to the shore of its own accord to fetch you, and we have no ropes
with which to haul it to and fro."
"Then there's nothing for it," said Otto, after a few moments' thought,
"but to make it big enough for two, or carry over the broken spars and
planks piecemeal, and put them together opposite the wreck; so, come
along."
This latter plan being adopted, they set to work with energy. To their
joy they found not only that a good deal of cordage--somewhat worn,
indeed, but still serviceable--was mingled with the wreckage, but that
many large protruding bolts and rusty nails formed convenient holdfasts,
which facilitated the building up and fastening together of the parts.
At last, after considerable labour, the raft was got ready early in the
afternoon, and the brothers, embarking on it with two long poles, pushed
off to the wreck while Pauline sat on the shore and watched them.
It was an anxious moment when they drew near enough to observe the
vessel more distinctly, for it was just possible that they might find in
her hold a supply of food and things they stood so much in need of,
while, on the other hand, there was a strong probability that everything
had been washed out of her long ago, or that her former crew had taken
out all that was worth removing.
"What if we should find casks of biscuits and barrels of pork, to say
nothing of tea and sugar, and such like?" murmured the sanguine Otto, as
they poled slowly out.
"And what if we should find nothing at all?" said Dominick.
"O Dom!" exclaimed Otto, in a voice so despairing that his companion
turned to look at him in surprise. "Look! see! the ship has been on
fire! It can only be the mere skeleton that is left."
Dominick turned quickly, and saw that his brother had reason for this
remark. They had by that time approached so near to the wreck that the
charred condition of part of her bulwarks, and specially of her lower
spars, became obvious; and when, a few minutes later, they stood on the
deck, the scene that presented itself was one of black desolation.
Evidently the ill-fated vessel had been enveloped in flames, for
everything on board was charred, and it was almost certain that her crew
had run her on the rocks as the only method of escaping, her boats
having been totally destroyed, as was apparent from the small portions
of them that still hung from the davits.
"Nothing left!" said Otto. "I think that Robinson Crusoe himself would
have given way to despair if _his_ wreck had been anything like this. I
wonder that even this much of it has been left above water after fire
had got hold of it."
"Perhaps the hull sank after the first crash on the rocks, and put out
the fire," suggested Dominick, "and then subsequent gales may have
driven her higher up. Even now her stern lies pretty deep, and
everything in her hold has been washed away."
There could be no doubt as to the latter point, for the deck had been
blown up, probably by gunpowder, near the main-hatch, leaving a great
hole, through which the hold could be seen almost as far as the bulkhead
of the forecastle.
Hastening forward to the hatchway of this part of the vessel, in the
feeble hope that they might still find something that would be of use,
they descended quickly, but the first glance round quenched such a hope,
for the fire had done its work there effectually, and, besides, there
were obvious indications that, what the fire had spared, her crew had
carried away. The only things left of any value were the charred
remnants of the hammocks and bedding which had belonged to the sailors.
"Hurrah!" shouted Otto, with a sudden burst of joy, as he leaped forward
and dragged out a quantity of the bedding; "here's what'll make fire at
last! You said, Dom, that burnt rag was capital tinder. Well, here we
have burnt sheets enough to last us for years to come!"
"That's true," returned Dominick, laughing at his brother's enthusiasm;
"let's go aft and see if we can stumble on something more."
But the examination of the after part of the vessel yielded no fruit.
As we have said, that part was sunk deeply, so that only the cabin
skylight was above water, and, although they both gazed intently down
through the water with which the cabin was filled, they could see
nothing whatever. With a boat-hook which they found jammed in the port
bulwarks, they poked and groped about for a considerable time, but
hooked nothing, and were finally obliged to return empty-handed to the
anxious Pauline.
Otto did not neglect, however, to carry off a pocketful of
burnt-sheeting, by means of which, with flint and steel, they were
enabled that night to eat their supper by the blaze of a cheering fire.
The human heart when young, does not quickly or easily give way to
despondency. Although the Rigondas had thus been cast on an island in
the equatorial seas, and continued week after week to dwell there,
living on wild fruits and eggs, and such animals and birds as they
managed to snare, with no better shelter than a rocky cavern, and with
little prospect of a speedy release, they did not by any means mourn
over their lot.
"You see," remarked Otto, one evening when his sister wondered, with a
sigh, whether their mother had yet begun to feel very anxious about
them, "you see, she could not have expected to hear much before this
time, for the voyage to Eastern seas is always a long one, and it is
well known that vessels often get blown far out of their courses by
monsoons, and simoons, and baboons, and such like southern hurricanes,
so motherkins won't begin to grow anxious, I hope, for a long time yet,
and it's likely that before she becomes _very_ uneasy about us, some
ship or other will pass close enough to see our signals and take us off
so--"
"By the way," interrupted Dominick, "have you tried to climb our
signal-tree, as you said you would do, to replace the flag that was
blown away by last night's gale?"
"Of course not. There's no hurry, Dom," answered Otto, who, if truth
must be told, was not very anxious to escape too soon from his present
romantic position, and thought that it would be time enough to attract
the attention of any passing vessel when they grew tired of their
solitude. "Besides," he continued, with that tendency to self-defence
which is so natural to fallen humanity, "I'm not a squirrel to run up
the straight stem of a branchless tree, fifty feet high or more."
"No, my boy, you're not a squirrel, but, as I have often told you, you
are a monkey--at least, monkey enough to accomplish your ends when you
have a mind to."
"Now, really you are too hard," returned Otto, who was busily employed
as he spoke in boring a hole through a cocoa-nut to get at the milk,
"you know very well that the branch of the neighbouring tree by which we
managed to reach the branches of the signal-tree has been blown away, so
that the thing is impossible, for the stem is far too big to be climbed
in the same way as I get up the cocoa-nut trees."
"That has nothing to do with the question," retorted Dominick, "you
_said_ you would try."
Otto looked with an injured expression at his sister and asked what she
thought of a man being required to attempt impossibilities.
"Not a man--a monkey," interjected his brother.
"Whether man or monkey," said Pauline, in her quiet but decided way, "if
you promised to attempt the thing, you are bound to try."
"Well, then, I will try, and here, I drink success to the trial." Otto
applied the cocoa-nut to his lips, and took a long pull. "Come along,
now, the sooner I prove the impossibility the better."
Rising at once, with an injured expression, the boy led the way towards
a little eminence close at hand, on the top of which grew a few trees of
various kinds, the tallest of these being the signal-tree, to which
Dominick had fixed one of the half-burnt pieces of sheeting, brought
from the wreck. The stem was perfectly straight and seemingly smooth,
and as they stood at its foot gazing up to the fluttering little piece
of rag that still adhered to it, the impossibility of the ascent became
indeed very obvious.
"Now, sir, are you convinced?" said Otto.
"No, sir, I am not convinced," returned Dominick.
"You said you would try."
Without another word Otto grasped the stem of the tree with arms and
legs, and did his best to ascend it. He had, in truth, so much of the
monkey in him, and was so wiry and tough, that he succeeded in getting
up full twelve or fourteen feet before being utterly exhausted. At that
point, however, he stuck, but instead of slipping down as he had
intended, and again requesting to know whether his brother was
convinced, he uttered a sharp cry, and shouted--
"Oh! I say, Dom, what am I to do?"
"Why, slip down, of course."
"But I can't. The bark seems to be made of needle-joints, all sticking
upwards. If I try to slip, my trousers vill remain behind, and--and--I
can't hold on much longer!"
"Let go then, and drop," said Dominick, stepping close to the tree.
"Oh no, don't!" cried Pauline, with a little shriek; "if you do you'll--
you'll--"
"Bust! Yes, I know I shall," shouted Otto, in despair.
"No fear," cried Dominick, holding out his arms, "let go, I'll cat--"
He was stopped abruptly by receiving a shock from his little brother
which sent him sprawling on his back. He sprang up, however, with a
gasp.
"Why, boy, I had no idea you were so heavy," he exclaimed, laughing.
"Now, don't you go boasting in future, you prime minister, that I can't
knock you down," said Otto, as he gathered himself up. "But I say,
you're not hurt, are you?" he added, with a look of concern, while
Pauline seized one of Dominick's hands and echoed the question.
"Not in the least--only a little wind knocked out of me. Moreover, I'm
not yet convinced that the ascent of that tree is an impossibility."
"You'll have to do it yourself, then," said Otto; "and let me warn you
beforehand that, though I'm very grateful to you, I won't stand under to
catch you."
"Was it not you who said the other night at supper that whatever a
fellow resolved to do he could accomplish, and added that, where there's
a will, there's a way?"
"I rather think it was you, Dom, who gave expression to those boastful
sentiments."
"It may be so. At all events I hold them. Come, now, lend a hand and
help me. The work will take some time, as we have no other implements
than our gully-knives, but we'll manage it somehow."
"Can I not help you?" asked Pauline.
"Of course you can. Sit down on the bank here, and I'll give you
something to do presently."
Dominick went, as he spoke, to a small tree, the bark of which was long,
tough, and stringy. Cutting off a quantity of this, he took it to his
sister, and showed her how to twist some of it into stout cordage.
Leaving her busily at work on this, he went down to the nearest bamboo
thicket and cut a stout cane. It took some time to cut, for the bamboo
was hard and the knife small for such work. From the end of the cane he
cut off a piece about a foot in length.
"Now, Otto, my boy, you split that into four pieces, and sharpen the end
of each piece, while I cut off another foot of the bamboo."
"But what are you going to do with these bits of stick?" asked Otto, as
he went to work with a will.
"You shall see. No use in wasting time with explanations just now. I
read of the plan in a book of travels. There's nothing like a good book
of travels to put one up to numerous dodges."
"I'm not so sure o' that," objected the boy. "I have read _Robinson
Crusoe_ over and over, and over again, and I don't recollect reading of
his having made use of pegs to climb trees with."
"Your memory may be at fault, perhaps. Besides, Robinson's is not the
only book of travels in the world," returned Dominick, as he hacked away
at the stout bamboo.
"No; but it is certainly the best," returned Otto, with enthusiasm, "and
I mean to imitate its hero."
"Don't do that, my boy," said Dominick; "whatever you do, don't imitate.
Act well the part allotted to you, whatever it may be, according to the
promptings of your own particular nature; but don't imitate."
"Humph! I won't be guided by your wise notions, Mr Premier. All I
know is, that I wish my clothes would wear out faster, so that I might
dress myself in skins of some sort. I would have made an umbrella by
this time, but it never seems to rain in this country."
"Ha! Wait till the rainy season comes round, and you'll have more than
enough of it. Come, we've got enough of pegs to begin with. Go into
the thicket now; cut some of the longest bamboos you can find, and bring
them to me; six or eight will do--slender ones, about twice the
thickness of my thumb at the ground."
While Otto was engaged in obeying this order, his brother returned to
the signal-tree.
"Well done, Pina," he said; "you've made some capital cordage."
"What are you going to do now, brother?"
"You shall see," said Dominick, picking up a heavy stone to use as a
hammer, with which he drove one of the hard, sharp pegs into the tree,
at about three feet from the ground. We have said the peg was a foot
long. As he fixed it in the tree about three inches deep, nine inches
of it projected. On this he placed his foot and raised himself to test
its strength. It bore his weight well. Above this first peg he fixed a
second, three feet or so higher, and then a third about level with his
face.
"Ah! I see," exclaimed Otto, coming up at that moment with several long
bamboos. "But, man, don't you see that if one of these pegs should give
way while you're driving those above it, down you come by the run, and,
if you should be high up at the time, death will be probable--lameness
for life, certain."
Dominick did not condescend to answer this remark, but, taking one of
the bamboos, stood it up close to the tree, not touching, but a few
inches from the trunk, and bound it firmly with the cord to the three
pegs. Thus he had the first three rounds or rungs of an upright ladder,
one side of which was the tree, the other the bamboo. Mounting the
second of these rungs he drove in a fourth peg, and fastened the bamboo
to it in the same way, and then, taking another step, he fixed a fifth
peg. Thus, step by step, he mounted till he had reached between fifteen
and twenty feet from the ground, where the upright bamboo becoming too
slender, another was called for and handed up by Otto. This was lashed
to the first bamboo, as well as to three of the highest pegs, and the
operation was continued. When the thin part of the second long bamboo
was reached, a third was added; and so the work progressed until the
ladder was completed, and the lower branches of the tree were gained.
Long before that point, however, Otto begged to be allowed to continue
and finish the work, which his brother agreed to, and, finally, the
signal flag was renewed, by the greater part of an old hammock being
lashed to the top of the tree.
But weeks and months passed away, and the flag continued to fly without
attracting the attention of any one more important, or more powerful to
deliver them, than the albatross and the wild sea-mew.
During this period the ingenuity and inventive powers of the party were
taxed severely, for, being utterly destitute of tools of any kind, with
the exception of the gully-knives before mentioned, they found it
extremely difficult to fashion any sort of implement.
"If we had only an axe or a saw," said Otto one morning, with a groan of
despair, "what a difference it would make."
"Isn't there a proverb," said Pauline, who at the time was busy making
cordage while Otto was breaking sticks for the fire, "which says that we
never know our mercies till we lose them?"
"Perhaps there is," said Otto, "and if there isn't, I don't care. I
don't like proverbs, they always tell you in an owlishly wise sort o'
way what you know only too well, at a time when you'd rather not know it
if possible. Now, if we only had an axe--ever so small--I would be able
to fell trees and cut 'em up into big logs, instead of spending hours
every day searching for dead branches and breaking them across my knee.
It's not a pleasant branch of our business, I can tell you."
"But you have the variety of hunting," said his sister, "and that, you
know, is an agreeable as well as useful branch."
"Humph! It's not so agreeable as I used to think it would be, when one
has to run after creatures that run faster than one's-self, and one is
obliged to use wooden spears, and slings, instead of guns. By the way,
what a surprising, I may say awful, effect a well-slung stone has on the
side of a little pig! I came upon a herd yesterday in the cane-brake,
and, before they could get away, I slung a big stone at them, which
caught the smallest of the squeakers fair in the side. The sudden
squeal that followed the slap was so intense, that I thought the life
had gone out of the creature in one agonising gush; but it hadn't, so I
slung another stone, which took it in the head and dropt it."
"Poor thing! I wonder how you can be so cruel."
"Cruel!" exclaimed Otto, "I don't do it for pleasure, do I? Pigs and
other things have got to be killed if we are to live."
"Well, I suppose so," returned Pauline, with a sigh; "at all events it
would never do to roast and eat them alive. But, about the axe. Is
there no iron-work in the wreck that might be fashioned into one?"
"Oh yes, sister dear," returned Otto, with a short laugh, "there's
plenty of iron-work. Some crowbars and ringbolts, and an anchor or two;
but do you suppose that I can slice off a bit of an anchor in the shape
of an axe as you slice a loaf?"
"Well no, not exactly, but I thought there might be some small flat
pieces that could be made to do."
"What is your difficulty," asked Dominick, returning from a hunting
expedition at that moment, and flinging down three brace of fowls on the
floor of the golden cave.
When the difficulty was stated, he remarked that he had often pondered
the matter while lying awake at night, and when wandering in the woods;
and he had come to the conclusion that they must return to what was
termed the stone period of history, and make their axes of flint.
Otto shook his head, and thought Pina's idea of searching the wreck till
they found a piece of flat metal was a more hopeful scheme.
"What do you say to trying both plans?" cried Pauline, with sudden
animation. "Come, as you have voluntarily elected me queen of this
realm, I command you, Sir Dominick, to make a flint axe without delay,
and you, Sir Otto, to make an iron one without loss of time."
"Your majesty shall be obeyed," replied her obedient subjects, and to
work they went accordingly, the very next morning.
Dominick searched far and near for a flint large enough for his purpose.
He found several, and tried to split them by laying them on a flat
stone, upheaving another stone as large as he could lift, and hurling it
down on them with all his might. Sometimes the flint would fly from
under the stone without being broken, sometimes it would be crushed to
fragments, and at other times would split in a manner that rendered it
quite unsuitable. At last, however, by patient perseverance, he
succeeded in splitting one so that an edge of it was thin and sharp,
while the other end was thick and blunt.
Delighted with this success, he immediately cut with his knife, a branch
of one of the hardest trees he could find, and formed it into an
axe-handle. Some of Pauline's cord he tied round the middle of this,
and then split it at one end, using his flint for the purpose, and a
stone for a hammer. The split extended only as far as the cord, and he
forced it open by means of little stones as wedges until it was wide
enough to admit the thick end of his flint axe-head. Using a piece of
soft stone as a pencil, he now marked the form of the flint, where it
touched the wood, exactly, and worked at this with his knife, as
patiently as a Chinaman, for several hours, until the wood fitted the
irregularities and indentations of the flint to a nicety. This of
itself caused the wood to hold the flint-head very firmly. Then the
wedges were removed, and when the handle was bound all round the split
part with cord, and the flint-head enveloped in the same, the whole
thing became like a solid mass.
Gingerly and anxiously did Dominick apply it to a tree. To his joy his
axe caused the chips to fly in all directions. He soon stopped,
however, for fear of breaking it, and set off in triumph to the golden
cave.
Meanwhile Otto, launching the raft, went on board the wreck to search
for a suitable bit of iron. As he had said, there was plenty on board,
but none of the size or shape that he required, and he was about to quit
in despair when he observed the flat iron plates, about five inches
square and quarter of an inch thick, with a large hole in the centre of
each, which formed the sockets that held the davits for suspending the
ship's boats. A crowbar enabled him, after much trouble, to wrench off
one of these. A handspike was, after some hours' labour, converted into
a handle with one side cut flat. Laying the plate on this, he marked
its exact size, and then cut away the wood until the iron sank its own
thickness into it. There were plenty of nails in the wreck; with these
he nailed the iron, through its own nail-holes, to the hard handspike,
and, still further to secure it, he covered it with a little piece of
flat wood, which he bound firmly on with some cordage made by his sister
from cocoa-nut fibre. As the iron projected on both sides of the
handle, it thus formed a double-edged axe of the most formidable
appearance. Of course the edges required grinding down, but this was a
mere matter of detail, to be accomplished by prolonged and patient
rubbing on a stone!
Otto arrived triumphantly at the golden cave almost at the same moment
with his brother, and they both laid their axes at the feet of the
queen.
"Thanks, my trusty vassals," she said; "I knew you would both succeed,
and had prepared a royal feast against your return."
"To which I have brought a royal appetite, your majesty," said Otto.
"In truth so have I," added Dominick.
There was a good deal of jesting in all this; nevertheless the trio sat
down to supper that night highly pleased with themselves. While eating,
they discussed, with much animation, the merits of the axes, and
experienced no little difficulty in deciding which was the better tool.
At last Pauline settled the matter by declaring that the iron axe, being
the strongest, was, perhaps, the best; but as it was not yet sharpened,
while Dominick's was ready for immediate use, the flint axe was in
present circumstances better.
"So then, being equal," said Otto, "and having had a splendid supper, we
will retire to rest."
Thus, in devising means for increasing their comforts, and supplying
their daily necessities, the days and weeks flew swiftly by.