Paul and Virginia being now about twelve years of age, Virginia goes, accompanied by Paul, to restore to the master a runaway female slave to whom he had been cruel, and to intercede with him on the sufferer's behalf. She has accomplished her purpose, and the two have set out to return. They lose their way. This is the state of the case at the point at which our first extract begins, as follows: "God will have pity on us," replied Virginia; "he listens to the voice of the little birds which ask him for food." She had scarcely uttered these words when they heard the noise of water falling from a neighboring rock. They hastened to it, and, after having quenched their thirst at this spring clearer than crystal, they gathered and ate a few cresses which grew on its banks. As they were looking around them to find some more substantial nourishment, Virginia descried a young palm-tree among the trees of the wood. The cabbage which is found at the top of this tree, inclosed within its leaves, is an excellent food; but although its stalk is not thicker than a man's leg it was more than sixty feet high. The wood of this tree is indeed composed only of a collection of filaments; but its internal bark is so hard that it blunts the sharpest hatchets, and Paul had not even a knife. He thought of setting fire to this palm-tree at its foot. Another difficulty--he had no steel to strike fire with, and besides, in this island so covered with rocks, I do not believe it would be possible to find a single flint. Necessity inspires industry, and often the most useful inventions have come from men reduced to extremity. Paul resolved to light a fire after the manner of the negroes. With the sharp end of a stone he made a small hole in the branch of a tree that was very dry, which he placed under his feet; he then with the edge of the stone made a point to another branch equally dry, but of a different kind of wood. He next placed the piece of pointed wood in the small hole of the branch which was under his feet, and turning it rapidly round in his hands, as one turns a mill to froth chocolate, he in a few moments perceived smoke and sparks arise from the point of contact. He collected together dry herbs and other branches of trees, and set fire to the foot of the palm-tree, which soon afterward fell with a violent noise. The fire served him also in stripping the cabbage of the long woody and prickly leaves which enclosed it. Virginia and he ate a part of this cabbage raw, and the rest cooked in the ashes, and they found them equally agreeable to the taste.... After their meal ... an hour of walking brought them to the banks of a large river, which barred their way.... The noise of its waters terrified Virginia; she dared not try to ford it. Paul accordingly took Virginia on his back, and passed thus laden over the slippery rocks of the river, regardless of the turbulence of the waters.