The Island Queen - Robert Michael Ballantyne (e book reader pdf txt) 📗

a hole under a prickly bush, while the discomfited army plunged headlong into the same, and stuck fast.

Meanwhile the rest of the porcine family had found refuge in an almost impenetrable part of the thicket.

"Pork, your Majesty," said Otto, on returning from the field of battle, "may at all events be counted as one of the products of your dominions."

"Truly it would seem so," responded the Queen, with a laugh; "nevertheless there does not appear to be much hope of its forming a source of supply to the royal larder."

"Time will show," said Dominick, coming up at the moment; "and see, here are several kinds of shellfish, which will form a pleasant addition to our fare."

"Ay, and I saw eggs among the reeds," said Otto, "some of which--"

"Not pigs' eggs, surely?" interrupted Dominick.

"They may be so," retorted Otto; "the fact that English pigs don't lay eggs, is no argument against South Sea pigs doing so, if they choose. But, as I was about to say, your Majesty, when the Premier interrupted me--some of these eggs I gathered, and would have presented them as an offering from the army, if I had not fallen and crushed them beyond repair."

In corroboration of what he said, Otto opened his coat pocket and revealed in its depths a mass of yellow substance, and broken shells.

"Horrible!" exclaimed Pauline; "how will you ever get it cleaned?"

"By turning it inside out--thus, most gracious Queen."

He reversed the pocket as he spoke, allowing the yellow compound to drip on the ground, and thereafter wiped it with grass.

"I wouldn't have minded this loss so much," he continued, "if I had not lost that little pig. But I shall know him again when I see him, and you may depend on it that he is destined ere long to be turned into pork chops."

"Well, then, on the strength of that hope we will continue the survey of our possessions," said Dominick, leading the party still further into the low grounds.

For some time the trio wandered about without making any further discoveries of importance until they came to a thicket, somewhat similar to the one near which they had been cast on shore, but much smaller. On entering it they were startled by a loud cackling noise, accompanied by the whirring of wings.

"Sounds marvellously like domestic fowls," said Dominick, as he pushed forward. And such it turned out to be, for, on reaching an open glade in the thicket, they beheld a large flock of hens running on ahead of them, with a splendid cock bringing up the rear, which turned occasionally to cast an indignant look at the intruders.

"That accounts for your eggs, Otto," observed Pauline.

"Yes, and here are more of them," said the boy, pointing to a nest with half a dozen eggs in it, which he immediately proceeded to gather.

"It is quite evident to me," remarked Dominick, as they continued to advance, "that both the pigs and fowls must have been landed from the wreck that lies on the shore, and that, after the death of the poor fellows who escaped the sea, they went wild. Probably they have multiplied, and we may find the land well stocked."

"I hope so. Perhaps we may find some more traces of the shipwrecked crew," suggested Pauline.

Their expectations were not disappointed, for, on returning in the evening from their tour of exploration, they came on a partially cleared place in the thicket beside the golden cave, which had evidently been used as a garden. In the midst of a mass of luxuriant undergrowth, which almost smothered them, vegetables of various kinds were found growing--among others the sweet potato.

Gathering some of these, Otto declared joyfully that he meant to have a royal feast that night, but a difficulty which none of them had thought of had to be faced and overcome before that feast could be enjoyed. It was just as they arrived at the golden cave that this difficulty presented itself to their minds.

"Dom," said Otto, with a solemn look, "how are we to make a fire?"

"By kindling it, of course."

"Yes, but, you stupid Premier, where are we to find a light?"

"To tell you the truth, my boy," returned Dominick, "I never thought of that till this moment, and I can't very well see my way out of the difficulty."

Pauline, to whom the brothers now looked, shook her head. Never before, she said, had she occasion to trouble her brain about a light. When she wanted one in England, all she had to do was to call for one, or strike a match. What was to be done in their present circumstances she had not the smallest conception.

"I'll tell you what," said Otto, after several suggestions had been made and rejected, "this is how we'll do it. We will gather a lot of dry grass and dead sticks and build them up into a pile with logs around it, then Pina will sit down and gaze steadily at the heart of the pile for some minutes with her great, brown, sparkling eyes she should be able to kindle a flame in the heart of almost anything in five minutes--or, say ten, at the outside, eh?"

"I should think," retorted the Queen, "that your fiery spirit or flashing wit might accomplish the feat in a shorter time."

"It seems to me," remarked Dominick, who had been thinking too hard to pay much regard to these pleasantries, "that if we live long here we shall have to begin life over again--not our own lives, exactly, but the world's life. We shall have to invent everything anew for ourselves; discover new methods of performing old familiar work, and, generally, exercise our ingenuity to the uttermost."

"That may be quite true, you philosophic Premier," returned Otto, "but it does not light our fire, or roast that old hen which you brought down with a stone so cleverly to-day. Come, now, let us exercise our ingenuity a little more to the purpose, if possible."

"If we had only some tinder," said Dominick, "we could find flint, I dare say, or some hard kind of stone from which fire could be struck with the back of a clasp-knife, but I have seen nothing like tinder to-day. I've heard that burnt rag makes capital tinder. If so, a bit of Pina's dress might do, but we can't burn it without fire."

For a considerable time the trio sought to devise some means of procuring fire, but without success, and they were at last fain to content themselves with another cold supper of cocoa-nut and water, after which, being rather tired, they went to rest as on the previous night.


CHAPTER FOUR.


DIFFICULTIES MET AND OVERCOME.

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