force of the tempest, and now lay bodily upon the rocks, the sea beating and breaking over her. But the piteous sight was our huts and storehouses—some lay in ruins on the ground, torn and shattered by cannon-balls, others had been set on fire, but the rain having so plenteously descended, had extinguished the flames, which, however, still smouldered in the blackened ashes and amid the charred timber, sending up thin volumes of bluish-grey smoke. All over the beach were scattered the bales and casks in which we had been used to store the provisions we made; and the principal of these the Spanish robbers were removing into the great ship; but, saddest sight of all, round the burning huts, and upon the shingle down to the water’s edge, were strewn the corpses of our late comrades, they having evidently sold their lives dear, for many Spanish soldiers and seamen were stretched out starkly among them. We long remained crouched amid the brushwood, regarding this sad spectacle as though fascinated by its horrors. Who had escaped? we thought; and, if any, where, and how? Not a man in our company but who was brave as the steel he wielded; but what could a handful of undisciplined hunters and sailors do against the broadsides of two Spanish men-of-war? Nicky and I looked at each other mournfully—unarmed, and fainting with hunger and thirst, what were we to do. Under the torments of the latter infliction, however, we found that we need not long suffer. In the hollow’s of the rocks, and the reservoirs of the large green leaves of divers plants, the heavy rain had left abundance of water, of which we drank and were refreshed. After this, we sat down in a sheltered nook to hold a council of war. The Spaniards were still busy upon the beach, and occasionally straggling into the woods. Boats were continually passing from the ships to our shingle wharf, and we saw preparations being made to warp the sloop off the rocks, from which we concluded that she had not been, much damaged. Nicky and I had hardly begun to consult upon our condition, when we suddenly heard the voices of men in a suppressed tone, not far from us in the thick underwood. As the speakers might be Spanish, we ceased to talk, and lay close, burying our persons, as it were, in the long coarse grass, and listening with all our ears. The distant talking continued, but in what tongue we could not tell, for the wind still blew in gusts, and ever and anon carried away the sound. At length, just as we were despairing of making out who our neighbours were, I felt something wet and cold glide from under my bare leg, and turning sharply round, I saw the grass moving, and the green glistening skin of a snake gliding over my flesh. Involuntarily, and with a great shout, I started up. ‘It is all over,’ said Nicky; ‘we are discovered.’ But in a moment a gruff voice hallooed— ‘Who goes there?’