Page:Adrift in the Pacific, Sampson Low, 1889.djvu/32

 old age, lay on the ground, and the boys sank to their knees in the carpet of dead leaves. But the birds flew away in alarm as if they had learnt that man was their enemy, and it was therefore likely that if the island was not inhabited, it was occasionally visited by the natives of a neighbouring territory.

In ten minutes the boys were through the wood, which grew thicker where the rocks at the back rose like a wall for a hundred and eighty feet. Was there in this wall any break or hollow which would afford them a refuge? A cave sheltered from the winds of the sea by the curtain of trees, and beyond the reach of the sea even in storms would be the very place for the boys to take up as their quarters until a careful exploration enabled them to move further inland.

Unluckily the wall was as bare of irregularity as the curtain of a fortification. There was no cave, nor was there any place where the cliff could be climbed. To reach the interior the shore would have to be followed till the cliff ended.

For half an hour Briant and his companion kept on to the southward along the foot of the cliff, and then they reached the right bank of the stream, which came meandering in from the east. On the right bank they stood under the shade of the lofty trees; but the left bank bordered a country of very different aspect; flat and verdureless, it looked like a wide marsh extending to the southern horizon. Disappointed in their hope of reaching the top of the cliff where they might have had a view of many miles over the country, the boys returned to the wreck.

Donagan and a few others were strolling among the rocks, while Jenkins, Iverson, Dole and Costar were amusing themselves by collecting shellfish. The explorers reported the result of their journey. Until a more distant expedition could be undertaken, it seemed best not to abandon the wreck, which, although stove in below and heeling considerably, would do very well as a temporary dwelling-place. The deck had been half