The land-breeze blew steadily, so I had to tug long and hard. At last, seeing the dusky bank close ahead, I paused to look for a landing-place, but none could I see. The nature of the coast seemed to have changed, the land hereabout being a long smooth wall of perpendicular rock, sinking sheerly into the sea, which rose and fell at the base, with a loud hissing, pouring, gurgling sound—not like the deep thunder of surf. I therefore set myself to pull eastwardly, in search of a creek or bay. I knew that the moon would presently rise over the land, and in sooth, in about an hour, I noticed the glow of her broad disc peeping over the edge of the cliff ahead of me, and showing it, fringed, as it were, with a line of bushes and brushwood, which curled over the precipice, surmounted now and then by one of the tall, bending palmetto trees. In about an hour I had moonlight sufficient to see pretty distinctly the great limestone ledges along which I was cautiously coasting—pausing on my oars, now and then, to hear the great buzz of insects and the forlorn cries of night-birds which floated from the land. It must have been near three o’clock, when I saw a black-like opening in the wall of cliff, and very cautiously I pulled my boat inwards. For some time I was in great doubt as to whether I had found a creek, but presently I beheld the two portals of rock between which I was, fairly astern of the boat, and saw and heard the white gleam of the surf breaking on the beach. But the former was too high for me to risk a landing, and I would have pulled out to sea again, but seeing another dark shadowy space upon the left, I made for it, hoping it might turn out an oblique channel leading from the main cove. I was not deceived, and presently the boat glided along a sort of dusky canal, with great rocks on either hand, clothed with rich creeping herbage; trees hanging over either ledge, and, as the channel narrowed, meeting, and by their intertwining boughs shutting out the blue sky. Below me the water showed as black as tar, yet sparkling, when the undulations from the outer creek caused it to rise and sink upon the bushy banks. Now and then a flutter of wings would echo in the narrow passage, and the loud shriek of a night-bird would drown the noise. Anon a scrambling, walloping sound, followed by a splash, as of a great animal scuttling from a ledge into the water, would ensue, and again, for a time, there would be deep silence. In about a quarter of an hour, the heave of the sea was no longer felt, owing, as I concluded, to the shallowing of the creek; and then, making fast the skiff to a great protruding branch, which I struck my head against, I rolled myself in a blanket which I found Wright had flung into the boat, and was soon asleep, being thus, as it were, safely anchored to the New World! CHAPTER III. I JOIN A BROTHERHOOD OF HUNTERS AND ADVENTURERS ON THE COAST.