Page:The crater; or, Vulcan's peak.djvu/392

 152 THE GRATER; intimated to him that there was no necessity for his being very particular, so long as the people were so few, and the products so abundant. The entire population of the Reef proper amounted, at this visitation, to just three hundred and twenty-six persons, of whom near a hundred were under twelve years of age. This, however, was exclusively of Kannakas, but included the absent seamen, whose fami lies dwelt there permanently. The settlement at Dunks Cove has been mentioned, and nothing need be said of it, beyond the fact that its agri culture had improved and been extended, its trees had grown, and its population increased. There was another similar settlement at East Cove or Bay would be the bet ter name which was at the place where Mark Woolston had found his way out to sea, by passing through a narrow and half-concealed inlet. This entrance to the group was now much used by the whalers, who fell in with a great many fish in the offing, and who found it very convenient to tow them into this large basin, and cut them up. Thence the blubber was sent down in lighters to Whaling Bight, to be tryed out. This arrangement saved a tow of some five- and-tvventy miles, and often prevented a loss of the fish, as sometimes occurred in the outside passage, by having it blown on an iron-bound coast. In consequence of these uses of the place, a settlement had grown up near it, and it already began to look like a spot to be civilized. As yet, however, it was the least advanced of all the settle ments in the group. At the West Bay, there was a sort of naval station and look-out port, to watch the people of the neighbouring isl ands. The improvements did not amount to much, how ever, being limited to one farm, a small battery that com manded the roads, and a fortified house, which was also a tavern. The agricultural, or strictly rural population of the group, were seated along the different channels nearest to the Reef. Some attention had been paid, in the choice, to the condition of the soil ; but, on the whole, few unoccupied spots could now be found within a league of the Reef, and on any of the principal passages that communicated with th e different islands. There were foot-paths, which might