Page:Quiller-Couch--Old fires and profitable ghosts.djvu/166

158 The place of our shipwreck you will find in 47° 66' N. lat., between Vancouver's Cape Flattery and the mouth of the Columbia River, but nearer to the former. Luckily the Independence had run in upon soft ground and at high water: so that when the tide dropped she still held together, though badly shaken and gaping in all her lower seams. To save her was out of the question. We therefore made the best of our way ashore in the dense fog, taking with us all our guns and the best part of our ammunition, as well as provisions and a quantity of sails and spars for rigging up tents. On no side of us could we see further than twenty paces. Of the inhabitants of this dreary spot—if indeed it had inhabitants—we knew nothing. So we first of all cleaned and loaded our firearms, and then set to work to light a fire and erect a shelter. We had done better, as it turned out, to have divided our company, and told off a fairly strong party to protect the ship. As it was, Captain Wills remained on board with three men to cut away and take down some of the heavier tackling.

We had set up one tent and were at work on the second, when I heard an exclamation from Margit, who stood by the big cauldron, a few paces off, cooking our dinner of salt pork. Looking up I saw a ring of savages all about us on the edge of the fog.

They were brown undersized men, clothed for the most part in dirty blankets and armed with short lances shod with iron, though one or two carried