"I had read a legend of this very place. It was about a young girl who had hidden herself from her enemies by swimming into the cave through the secret entrance below the surface of the river. "By this time my friends were getting worried about me. I felt a gentle pull at the rope and I heard them calling. Their voices seemed strange and far away. And now I was slowly lifted upward to find myself in the midst of my friends. "It was time to turn again toward the daylight. We said good-bye to the cave and its city of palaces. In another hour we were again in open air, looking at mountain tops. We asked ourselves if the day's wonderful sights really had been a dream or not." CHAPTER XII. THE HURRICANE. WEEKS pass by; it is August, and the midst of the rainy season. This is the time to be ready for hurricanes. No one feels safe, for at any moment he may be taken by surprise, and his home, with its massive stone walls, may be dashed to the ground. Such a thing never yet has happened to Manuel's family, but that does not keep fear away. Does not Manuel remember the story of Josephine, afterward the beautiful wife of Napoleon? She spent her young days on an island not far from Porto Rico. In a few hours the plantation on which she lived was wrecked by a hurricane and hardly a trace of her home was left. It is fearful to think of what she and her family suffered, but Manuel and Dolores cannot keep the story out of their minds when the midsummer storms arrive. They are kept in terror at least three months of the year, for the hurricane season begins the latter part of July, and the great winds may come at any moment from that time on to the end of October. If the children should visit the shore now, they would find all the boats drawn up high and dry in sheltered nooks. The fishermen are afraid to venture out to any distance for fear of sudden danger. This very morning Manuel's father looked at the barometer before he left the house, for that is the first thing to tell him a storm is approaching. Then he directed Alfonso to see if the iron bars were in good order for fastening the casements; everything must be in readiness for a sudden departure. After his ride around the plantation, he stopped at the hill-cave, or hurricane house, and directed one of the workmen to leave the door open for awhile, to air it. This cave was dug out of the side of a hill near the house when Manuel and Dolores were still babies. It is lined with a thick wall of stones; it has no windows or other opening except a low, narrow doorway. At the first sign of a hurricane, the whole family flee to this cave, and stay there till the storm is over. Look! the sky is overcast. And now it has become the colour of lead. How sultry it is! Not a leaf moves, except when a sudden gust of wind takes it by surprise. The barometer is falling rapidly. See the lightning flashing over the sky, with no sound of thunder to follow it.