On we went--death every instant threatening us--a death amid that dark, wild, troubled, storm-tossed ocean! At length the fierce roar of the wind and sea seemed to increase. We looked out before us into the darkness. "Breakers!--breakers ahead!" we shouted. A thrill of horror ran through our veins. In another moment we should be dashed to a thousand fragments among the wild rocks over which they so fiercely broke. To attempt to haul off in such a sea would have consigned us to an equally certain fate. The imminence of the danger seemed to sharpen our vision. A mass of foam, which seemed to leap high up into the dark sky, lay before us. Not a moment could a boat live attempting to pass through it. On both sides we turned our anxious gaze, to discover if any spot existed where the sea broke with less violence. Almost simultaneously we shouted, "A passage on the starboard-bow!" There appeared, if our eyes deceived us not, a dark space where the line of huge breakers was divided. We were rushing headlong to destruction. Not an instant was to be lost. The helm was put to port. We rose on the crest of a vast rolling sea. Down it came, thundering on the rocks on either side of us, throwing over them heavy showers of spray, sufficient almost to swamp us. Still we floated unharmed. The sea rolled on between what, in the darkness, appeared like walls of foam, and in another instant we found ourselves floating beyond the fierce turmoil of waters, just tossed gently by the waves, which found their way over the reef into a large lagoon within it! A shore fringed with trees lay before us. In five minutes we were landed safely on it, and the boat was secured to the stump of a fallen tree. It was too dark to allow us to attempt to penetrate into the interior, to ascertain the sort of place on which we had been thrown; so, returning to the boat and baling her out, we wrung our wet clothes and lay down to seek that rest we all, after our violent exertions and anxiety, so much needed. It must have been nearly daylight when we went to sleep. I know not how long we had slept. It would have been better for us had we driven sleep far from our eyelids, and been ready to pull out and wander over the inhospitable ocean the moment the gale abated, rather than have remained where we were. I was the first to open my eyes, and, looking up, I saw to my horror a nearly naked savage looking down into the boat with prying eyes from the bank above us. He was almost jet-black, with negro features and a full beard and moustache. His hair was frizzled out to a great size and covered by a brownish turban. Round his waist he wore the usual maro or kilt, with something like a shawl or plaid over his shoulders; and in his hand he held a long formidable-looking spear. From the turban on his head, I afterwards discovered that he was a chief.