Bordering it were the palmetto palms, with luscious fruit like plums in colour, and those enormous leaves, each of which are of such amazing length that they are used to roof houses; the oak, the ash, bananas, orange, lemon, mahogany and caoutchouc trees all growing in luxuriance together, and the coffee plant flourishing wild under the lofty cedars. Delighted with the beauty of the cool and shady place, Derval stretched himself at length upon the velvet sward, and proceeded to enjoy a cigar, while watching, high above his head, the struggles of a small bird which was caught in the web of a spider--one of those spiders there so remarkable for their size and a peculiar kind of beauty, and the webs of which are, in colour and substance, a veritable raw silk. His attention was next attracted by the appearance of a lady and a young girl walking slowly on the summit of a coral rock, or cliff, that overhung the salt pool. The lady, who carried a large white sunshade, was proceeding leisurely, reading a book, while the girl went hither and thither gathering flowers. "Take care, Clara darling," he heard the lady say; "keep back from the edge of the rocks." "Do let me gather these flowers," was the entreating reply, "and I shall make you such a lovely bouquet." "Stay, I insist upon it," said the lady. "Oh, I shall be so very careful," replied the sweet little English voice, which sounded so pleasantly to the ears of the listener,--but a shriek closed the sentence. When venturing to the verge to gather the coveted trifle, the girl had fallen over, and vanished from the eyes of her horrified companion--her governess, as she eventually proved to be--who fled, uttering wild and breathless cries for assistance, for she knew that the little one had fallen from a height of nearly a hundred feet. At the same moment a half stifled cry escaped Derval, who, with the keenest alarm, saw that in her descent a stump of laurel projecting from the cliff had caught a portion of the girl's dress, a species of muslin scarf that went round her waist, and there she hung, blind with terror and silent in her agony, some fifty feet above the rocks that shelved steeply downward to the pool or salt-water tarn. "Keep still, girl, keep still!" cried Derval, who saw that already her frail protection was beginning to rend, while he instantly commenced to climb towards her, and as only a British sailor can climb, finding footing and things to grasp where a landsman would have found none.