Page:The Swiss Family Robinson (Kingston).djvu/172

132 heralded his approach with a wheel-barrow, in the highest spirits at his good fortune in having found such a capital thing in which to bring home potatoes.

He was followed by Fritz, whose news was still more important. He had found, carefully packed and enclosed within partitions, what appeared to be the separate parts of a pinnace, with rigging and fittings complete, even to a couple of small brass guns. This was a great discovery, and I hastened to see if the lad was right. Indeed he was, but my pleasure was qualified by a sense of the arduous task it would be to put such a craft together so as to be fit for sea. For the present, we had barely time to get something to eat and hurry into the boat, where were collected our new acquisitions, namely, a copper boiler, iron plates, tobacco graters, two grindstones, a small barrel of powder, and another of flints, two wheel-barrows besides Jack's, which he kept under his own especial care.

As we drew near the shore, we were surprised to see a number of little figures ranged in a row along the water's edge, and apparently gazing fixedly at us. They seemed to wear dark coats and white waistcoats, and stood quite still with their arms dropping by their sides, only every now and then one would extend them gently, as though longing to embrace us.

“Ah! here at last come the pigmy inhabitants of the country to welcome us!” cried I, laughing.

“Oh, father!” exclaimed Jack, “I hope they are Lilliputians! I once read in a book about them, so there must be such people you know, only these look rather too large.”

“You must be content to give up the Lilliputians and accept penguins, my dear Jack,” said I. “We have not before seen them in such numbers, but Ernest knocked one down, if you remember, soon after we landed. They are excellent swimmers, but helpless on land, as they can neither fly nor run.”

We were gradually approaching the land as I spoke, and no