sudden burst of exclamation when I recognised the little hill, to the top of which I had climbed to look around, after scrambling up the precipitous banks of the cove. I now knew whereabouts we were, almost to a yard, and carefully guiding the rest, and taking great heed to make no noise, we made our way to the top of the very scaur or ravine, up which I had crept from the water. It was not easy, however, to make out whether the cove was empty, for the morning was yet dim and grey, and the trees grew thick below. We proceeded, however, moving in single file along the edge of the rock, which, as the reader remembers, was thickly covered with wood, such as bushes and parasitical plants, with great trees growing out of the rifts and cracks in the cliff, and bending over the water so that the branches of those on both sides interlacing, quite canopied the still deep sea beneath. As we clambered on by the edge of the precipice, a sound suddenly struck my ear with which I was too well acquainted to be easily deceived—it was the flap of canvas. Nicky heard it as well as myself, and we all paused. The land wind was just beginning to die out, and only came in heavy dank puffs down from the hills. We waited for the next gust; it shook the dew from the branches in a great sparkling shower, and gave a great rustle, as it were, down the ravine, in the middle of which, we again heard the flap of canvas, and a rattle as of reef points against a sail. Being guided by the sound, we proceeded a few paces onwards, and then coming to a comparatively clear bit of ground, we crawled upon our bellies to the edge of the cliff, and through the trees and boughs saw a small vessel with two masts, of the class called schooners, beneath. She was moored in the very centre of the cove, very snugly, being made fast by four hawsers, two a-head and two astern, to the trunks of trees growing near the water on either bank. She had two boats in the water, floating by her main chains, and one of them I immediately recognised to be the object of our journey. Here, then, was the vessel to whom the hunters, whose guns we had heard, evidently belonged: and, indeed, without other evidence, Nicky and Le Picard knew enough about the fashion of those seas to be sure that the schooner was Spanish built, she being, possibly, a fishing vessel from Cuba, although what she did on the coast here, we could not well imagine. The question now, however, was how we were to act? Thinking themselves, no doubt, in security, there was not a single man awake upon deck; but several stout fellows were lying asleep under canvas and tarpaulins upon the forecastle. Presently, after we had gazed our fill upon the schooner, Nicky asked our opinion as to whether it would be possible to clamber down to the water’s edge, and make off with both boats before the crew awoke. But Le Picard thought the risk too great. Besides, he argued, when they miss the boats, they