Page:The crater; or, Vulcan's peak.djvu/255

OR, VULCAN S PEAK. 15 merely an outline of their situation, with an injunction to let Unirf direct the movements. No sooner was this important note written, than Unus hastened down to the cove. He was accompanied by Mark, Peters and Peggy ; the former to give his instruc tions, and the two latter to act as interpreters. Nor was the sister without feeling for the brother on the occasion. She certainly did not regard his enterprise as it would have been looked upon by a civilized woman, but she manifested a proper degree of interest in its success. Her parting words to her brother, were advice to keep well to wind ward, in order that, as he got near the boat, he might float down upon it with the greater facility, aided by the waves. The young Indian was soon ready. The note was se cured in his hair, and moving gently in the water, he swam out of the cove with the ease, if not with the rapidity of a fish. Peggy clapped her hands and laughed, and other wise manifested a sort of childish delight, as if pleased that one of her race should so early make himself useful to the countrymen of her husband. She and Peters re paired to the battery, which was the proper station of the man, while Mark went nimbly up the Stairs, on his way to the Peak. And here we might put in a passing word on the subject of these ascents and descents. The governor had now been accustomed to them more than a twelvemonth, and he found that the effect they produced on the muscles of his lower limbs was absolutely surprising. He could now ascend the Stairs in half the time he had taken on his first trials, and he could carry burthens up and down them, that at first he would not have dreamed of attempt ing even to take on his shoulders. The same was true with all the colonists, male and female, who began to run about the cliffs like so many goats chamois would be more poetical and who made as light of the Stairs as the go vernor himself. When Mark reached the Peak again, he found matters drawing near to a crisis. The canoes were within a league T)f the island, coming on steadily in line, and paddling with measured sweeps of their paddles. As yet, the sail of Juno s boat had escaped them. This was doubtless owing to their lowness in the water, and the distance that still