The Island Queen Page 4

  CHAPTER FOUR.

  DIFFICULTIES MET AND OVERCOME.

  The next day Pauline and her brothers visited the wreck, and here newdifficulties met them, for although the vessel lay hard and fast on therocks, there was a belt of water between it and the main shore, whichwas 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 withwhich to make a raft.

  "There's sure to be some lying about, you know," he said, "for a wreckcould hardly take place without something or other in the way of sparsor wreckage being washed ashore."

  "But don't you think," suggested Otto, "that the men whose graves wehave found may have used it all up?"

  Otto was right. Not a scrap of timber or cordage of any kind was to befound after a most diligent search, and they were about to give it up indespair, when Pauline remembered the bay where they had been castashore, and which we have described as being filled with wreckage.

  In truth, this bay and the reef with its group of islands lay right inthe track of one of those great ocean currents which, as the readerprobably knows, are caused by the constant circulation of all the watersof the sea between the equator and the poles. This grand and continuousflow is caused by difference of temperature and density in sea-water atdifferent places. At the equator the water is warm, at the poles it iscold. This alone would suffice to cause circulation--somewhat as watercirculates in a boiling pot--but other active agents are at work. TheArctic and Antarctic snows freshen the sea-water as well as cool it,while equatorial heat evaporates as well as warms it, and thus leaves asuperabundance of salt and lime behind. The grand ocean current thuscaused is broken up into smaller streams, and the courses of these arefixed by the conformation of land--just as a river's flow is turnedright or left, and sometimes backward in eddies, by the form of itsbanks 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 andsometimes cast vessels and wreckage on its shores.

  Hastening to the bay, they accordingly found enough of broken spars andplanks, to have made half a dozen rafts, twice the size of that requiredto go off with to the wreck; so to work they went at once with eagerenthusiasm.

  "Hold on!" shouted Dominick, after a few spars had been collected anddragged up on the sand.

  Otto and Pauline paused in their labour, and looked anxiously at theirbrother, 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 thepoint, to where the wreck lies."

  "Well, then," cried Otto, with the ready assurance of ignorance, "we'lljust drag it overland to the wreck, and launch it there."

  "But, Otto, you have not taken into consideration the fact that our raftmust be so large that, when finished, the dragging of it over roughground would require three or four horses instead of three humanbeings."

  "Well, then," returned the boy, "we'll make it small, just big enough tocarry one person, and then we'll be able to drag it overland, and can gooff to the wreck one at a time."

  "Now, just think, brainless one," retorted Dominick; "suppose that Iwere 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 goback to the shore of its own accord to fetch you, and we have no ropeswith 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 andplanks piecemeal, and put them together opposite the wreck; so, comealong."

  This latter plan being adopted, they set to work with energy. To theirjoy they found not only that a good deal of cordage--somewhat worn,indeed, but still serviceable--was mingled with the wreckage, but thatmany 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 theafternoon, and the brothers, embarking on it with two long poles, pushedoff to the wreck while Pauline sat on the shore and watched them.

  It was an anxious moment when they drew near enough to observe thevessel more distinctly, for it was just possible that they might find inher 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 everythinghad been washed out of her long ago, or that her former crew had takenout all that was worth removing.

  "What if we should find casks of biscuits and barrels of pork, to saynothing of tea and sugar, and such like?" murmured the sanguine Otto, asthey 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 companionturned to look at him in surprise. "Look! see! the ship has been onfire! It can only be the mere skeleton that is left."

  Dominick turned quickly, and saw that his brother had reason for thisremark. They had by that time approached so near to the wreck that thecharred condition of part of her bulwarks, and specially of her lowerspars, became obvious; and when, a few minutes later, they stood on thedeck, the scene that presented itself was one of black desolation.Evidently the ill-fated vessel had been enveloped in flames, foreverything on board was charred, and it was almost certain that her crewhad run her on the rocks as the only method of escaping, her boatshaving been totally destroyed, as was apparent from the small portionsof them that still hung from the davits.

  "Nothing left!" said Otto. "I think that Robinson Crusoe himself wouldhave given way to despair if _his_ wreck had been anything like this. Iwonder that even this much of it has been left above water after firehad got hold of it."

  "Perhaps the hull sank after the first crash on the rocks, and put outthe fire," suggested Dominick, "and then subsequent gales may havedriven her higher up. Even now her stern lies pretty deep, andeverything in her hold has been washed away."

  There could be no doubt as to the latter point, for the deck had beenblown up, probably by gunpowder, near the main-hatch, leaving a greathole, through which the hold could be seen almost as far as the bulkheadof the forecastle.

  Hastening forward to the hatchway of this part of the vessel, in thefeeble 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, therewere obvious indications that, what the fire had spared, her crew hadcarried away. The only things left of any value were the charredremnants of the hammocks and bedding which had belonged to the sailors.

  "Hurrah!" shouted Otto, with a sudden burst of joy, as he leaped forwardand dragged out a quantity of the bedding; "here's what'll make fire atlast! You said, Dom, that burnt rag was capital tinder. Well, here wehave 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 cabinskylight was above water, and, although they both gazed intently downthrough the water with which the cabin was filled, they could seenothing whatever. With a boat-hook which they found jammed in the portbulwarks, they poked and groped about for a considerable time, buthooked nothing, and were finally obliged to return empty-handed to theanxious Pauline.

  Otto
did not neglect, however, to carry off a pocketful ofburnt-sheeting, by means of which, with flint and steel, they wereenabled 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 todespondency. Although the Rigondas had thus been cast on an island inthe equatorial seas, and continued week after week to dwell there,living on wild fruits and eggs, and such animals and birds as theymanaged to snare, with no better shelter than a rocky cavern, and withlittle prospect of a speedy release, they did not by any means mournover their lot.

  "You see," remarked Otto, one evening when his sister wondered, with asigh, whether their mother had yet begun to feel very anxious aboutthem, "you see, she could not have expected to hear much before thistime, for the voyage to Eastern seas is always a long one, and it iswell known that vessels often get blown far out of their courses bymonsoons, 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, someship or other will pass close enough to see our signals and take us offso--"

  "By the way," interrupted Dominick, "have you tried to climb oursignal-tree, as you said you would do, to replace the flag that wasblown away by last night's gale?"

  "Of course not. There's no hurry, Dom," answered Otto, who, if truthmust be told, was not very anxious to escape too soon from his presentromantic position, and thought that it would be time enough to attractthe attention of any passing vessel when they grew tired of theirsolitude. "Besides," he continued, with that tendency to self-defencewhich is so natural to fallen humanity, "I'm not a squirrel to run upthe 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, youare a monkey--at least, monkey enough to accomplish your ends when youhave a mind to."

  "Now, really you are too hard," returned Otto, who was busily employedas 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 wemanaged to reach the branches of the signal-tree has been blown away, sothat the thing is impossible, for the stem is far too big to be climbedin 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 shethought 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, "ifyou promised to attempt the thing, you are bound to try."

  "Well, then, I will try, and here, I drink success to the trial." Ottoapplied 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 towardsa little eminence close at hand, on the top of which grew a few trees ofvarious kinds, the tallest of these being the signal-tree, to whichDominick had fixed one of the half-burnt pieces of sheeting, broughtfrom the wreck. The stem was perfectly straight and seemingly smooth,and as they stood at its foot gazing up to the fluttering little pieceof rag that still adhered to it, the impossibility of the ascent becameindeed 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 andlegs, and did his best to ascend it. He had, in truth, so much of themonkey in him, and was so wiry and tough, that he succeeded in gettingup full twelve or fourteen feet before being utterly exhausted. At thatpoint, however, he stuck, but instead of slipping down as he hadintended, and again requesting to know whether his brother wasconvinced, 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 stickingupwards. If I try to slip, my trousers vill remain behind, and--and--Ican'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 brotherwhich sent him sprawling on his back. He sprang up, however, with agasp.

  "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'tknock 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, whilePauline seized one of Dominick's hands and echoed the question.

  "Not in the least--only a little wind knocked out of me. Moreover, I'mnot 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 youbeforehand that, though I'm very grateful to you, I won't stand under tocatch you."

  "Was it not you who said the other night at supper that whatever afellow resolved to do he could accomplish, and added that, where there'sa will, there's a way?"

  "I rather think it was you, Dom, who gave expression to those boastfulsentiments."

  "It may be so. At all events I hold them. Come, now, lend a hand andhelp me. The work will take some time, as we have no other implementsthan 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 yousomething 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 hissister, 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 bamboothicket and cut a stout cane. It took some time to cut, for the bamboowas hard and the knife small for such work. From the end of the cane hecut off a piece about a foot in length.

  "Now, Otto, my boy, you split that into four pieces, and sharpen the endof 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, ashe went to work with a will.

  "You shall see. No use in wasting time with explanations just now. Iread of the plan in a book of travels. There's nothing like a good bookof travels to put one up to numerous dodges."

  "I'm not so sure o' that," objected the boy. "I have read _RobinsonCrusoe_ over and over, and over again, and I don't recollect reading ofhis having made use of pegs to climb trees with."

  "Your memory may be at fault, perhaps. Besides, Robinson's is not theonly book of travels in the world," returned Dominick, as he hacked awayat the stout bamboo.

  "No; but it is certainly the best," returned Otto, with enthusiasm, "andI 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 thepromptings of your own particular nature; but don't imitate."

  "Humph! I won't be guided by your wise notions, Mr Premier. All Iknow is, that I wish my clothes would wear out faster, so that I mightdress myself in skins of some sort. I would have made an umbrella bythis time, but it never seems to rain in this country."

  "Ha! Wait till the rainy season comes round, and you'll have more thanenough of it. Come, we've got enough of pegs to begin with. Go intothe thicket now; cut some of the longest bamboos you can find, and bringthem to me; six or eight will do--slender ones, about twice thethickness of my thumb at the ground."

  While Otto was engaged in obeying this order, his brother returned tothe 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 ahammer, 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 footlong. As he fixed it in the tree about three inches deep, nine inchesof it projected. On this he placed his foot and raised himself to testits strength. It bore his weight well. Above this first peg he fixed asecond, three feet or so higher, and then a third about level with hisface.

  "Ah! I see," exclaimed Otto, coming up at that moment with several longbamboos. "But, man, don't you see that if one of these pegs should giveway 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--lamenessfor life, certain."

  Dominick did not condescend to answer this remark, but, taking one ofthe bamboos, stood it up close to the tree, not touching, but a fewinches from the trunk, and bound it firmly with the cord to the threepegs. 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 thesecond of these rungs he drove in a fourth peg, and fastened the bambooto it in the same way, and then, taking another step, he fixed a fifthpeg. Thus, step by step, he mounted till he had reached between fifteenand twenty feet from the ground, where the upright bamboo becoming tooslender, another was called for and handed up by Otto. This was lashedto the first bamboo, as well as to three of the highest pegs, and theoperation was continued. When the thin part of the second long bamboowas reached, a third was added; and so the work progressed until theladder was completed, and the lower branches of the tree were gained.

  Long before that point, however, Otto begged to be allowed to continueand finish the work, which his brother agreed to, and, finally, thesignal flag was renewed, by the greater part of an old hammock beinglashed to the top of the tree.

  But weeks and months passed away, and the flag continued to fly withoutattracting the attention of any one more important, or more powerful todeliver them, than the albatross and the wild sea-mew.

  During this period the ingenuity and inventive powers of the party weretaxed severely, for, being utterly destitute of tools of any kind, withthe exception of the gully-knives before mentioned, they found itextremely difficult to fashion any sort of implement.

  "If we had only an axe or a saw," said Otto one morning, with a groan ofdespair, "what a difference it would make."

  "Isn't there a proverb," said Pauline, who at the time was busy makingcordage while Otto was breaking sticks for the fire, "which says that wenever know our mercies till we lose them?"

  "Perhaps there is," said Otto, "and if there isn't, I don't care. Idon'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 itif possible. Now, if we only had an axe--ever so small--I would be ableto fell trees and cut 'em up into big logs, instead of spending hoursevery 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, youknow, is an agreeable as well as useful branch."

  "Humph! It's not so agreeable as I used to think it would be, when onehas to run after creatures that run faster than one's-self, and one isobliged 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 theside 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, whichcaught the smallest of the squeakers fair in the side. The suddensqueal that followed the slap was so intense, that I thought the lifehad gone out of the creature in one agonising gush; but it hadn't, so Islung 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 andother things have got to be killed if we are to live."

  "Well, I suppose so," returned Pauline, with a sigh; "at all events itwould never do to roast and eat them alive. But, about the axe. Isthere no iron-work in the wreck that might be fashioned into one?"

  "Oh yes, sister dear," returned Otto, with a short laugh, "there'splenty 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 shapeof an axe as you slice a loaf?"

  "Well no, not exactly, but I thought there might be some small flatpieces that could be made to do."

  "What is your difficulty," asked Dominick, returning from a huntingexpedition at that moment, and flinging down three brace of fowls on thefloor of the golden cave.

  When the difficulty was stated, he remarked that he had often ponderedthe 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 wastermed the stone period of history, and make their axes of flint.

  Otto shook his head, and thought Pina's idea of searching the wreck tillthey found a piece of flat metal was a more hopeful scheme.

  "What do you say to trying both plans?" cried Pauline, with suddenanimation. "Come, as you have voluntarily elected me queen of thisrealm, 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 towork 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 flatstone, upheaving another stone as large as he could lift, and hurling itdown on them with all his might. Sometimes the flint would fly fromunder the stone without being broken, sometimes it would be crushed tofragments, and at other times would split in a manner that rendered itquite unsuitable. At last, however, by patient perseverance, hesucceeded 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 branchof one of the hardest trees he could find, and formed it into anaxe-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 astone for a hammer. The split extended only as far as the cord, and heforced it open by means of little stones as wedges until it was wideenough to admit the thick end of his flint axe-head. Using a piece ofsoft stone as a pencil, he now marked the form of the flint, where ittouched the wood, exactly, and worked at this with his knife, aspatiently as a Chinaman, for several hours, until the wood fitted theirregularities and indentations of the flint to a nicety. This ofitself caused the wood to hold the flint-head very firmly. Then thewedges were removed, and when the handle was bound all round the splitpart with cord, and the flint-head enveloped in the same, the wholething became like a solid mass.

  Gingerly and anxiously did Dominick apply it to a tree. To his joy hisaxe caused the chips to fly in all directions. He soon stopped,however, for fear of breaking it, and set off in triumph to the goldencave.

  Meanwhile Otto, launching the raft, went on board the wreck to searchfor 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 quitin despair when he observed the flat iron plates, about five inchessquare and quarter of an inch thick, with a large hole in the centre ofeach, which formed the sockets that held the davits for suspending theship's boats. A crowbar enabled him, after much trouble, to wrench offone of these. A handspike was, after some hours' labour, converted intoa handle with one side cut flat. Laying the plate on this, he markedits exact size, and then cut away the wood until the iron sank its ownthickness into it. There were plenty of nails in the wreck; with thesehe nailed the iron, through its own nail-holes, to the hard handspike,and, still further to se
cure it, he covered it with a little piece offlat wood, which he bound firmly on with some cordage made by his sisterfrom cocoa-nut fibre. As the iron projected on both sides of thehandle, it thus formed a double-edged axe of the most formidableappearance. Of course the edges required grinding down, but this was amere matter of detail, to be accomplished by prolonged and patientrubbing on a stone!

  Otto arrived triumphantly at the golden cave almost at the same momentwith his brother, and they both laid their axes at the feet of thequeen.

  "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 satdown to supper that night highly pleased with themselves. While eating,they discussed, with much animation, the merits of the axes, andexperienced no little difficulty in deciding which was the better tool.At last Pauline settled the matter by declaring that the iron axe, beingthe strongest, was, perhaps, the best; but as it was not yet sharpened,while Dominick's was ready for immediate use, the flint axe was inpresent circumstances better.

  "So then, being equal," said Otto, "and having had a splendid supper, wewill retire to rest."

  Thus, in devising means for increasing their comforts, and supplyingtheir daily necessities, the days and weeks flew swiftly by.