‘Her ladyship was washed overboard,’ said Finn. ‘Dowling, who was swimming, got one of his hands foul of your hair, my lady. He kept hold, towed your ladyship as the swell ran him forrads, felt ground, and hauled ye ashore. He behaved well.’ ‘My poor maid is drowned!’ cried Laura. ‘Too many, miss, too many! Oh, my God, too many!’ muttered poor Finn. Meanwhile my eye had been resting incuriously upon the singular lump of rock that stood apparently poised on the highest slope in the very centre of the island. On a sudden I started to a perception that for the instant I deemed purely fanciful. The block of stuff was distant from where we were eating our breakfast some two hundred and eighty to three hundred yards. The complexion of it whilst the sky was in shadow had so much of the meerschaum-like tint of the island that one easily took it to be a mass of lava identical with the rest of the volcanic creation; but the sun was now pouring his brilliant white fires upon it, and I noticed a deal of sparkling in it as though it were coated with salt or studded with flints of crystal, whilst the bed in which it lay and the slope round about were of a dead, unreflecting pale yellow. My fixed regard attracted the attention of the others. One of the two seamen looked and called out, ‘That ain’t a part of the island, sir.’ ‘What form does it take to your fancy?’ I asked, addressing my companions generally. There was a pause and Laura said, ‘It looks like a ship, an unwieldy vessel coming at us. Do you notice two erections like broken masts?’ Finn peered under his hand. ‘It certainly looks uncommonly like as if it had been a ship in its day,’ he exclaimed, ‘but these ’ere convulsions, I am told, are made up o’ fantastics.’ Cutbill and his companion were now approaching; they were fiery hot, their faces crimson, and they moved with an air of distress. Yet Cutbill made shift to sing out as he approached, pointing as he spoke, ‘Mr. Monson, there’s a ship ashore up there, sir. You get the shape of her plain round the corner.’ ‘Come, lads!’ I cried, ‘sit and fall to. There’s plenty to eat here and drink to give you life. You have got well through a bitter business. Finn, do you feel equal to inspecting that object?’ ‘Ay, sir,’ he answered. ‘I’m drawing my breath better. But it’s the mind, Mr. Monson--it’s the mind.’ ‘Then come, all of us who will,’ I cried. ‘Laura, here is my arm for you, and here is a pocket handkerchief too to tie round your head.’ Lady Monson looked at her sister and rose with her. Laura came to my side and we started. CHAPTER XXX. WE BOARD THE GALLEON The surface of the island was so honeycombed that one dared not look elsewhere than downwards whilst walking, and so it was not until we had drawn close to the huge rock-like lump that I was able to give my attention to it.