TALES OF FISHES 



and soon disappears from the porous canon-beds. 

 Water-holes were rare and springs rarer. The sum- 

 mit was flat, except for some rounded domes of 

 mountains, and there the deadly choUa cactus grew 

 — ^not in profusion, but enough to prove the dread 

 of the Mexicans for this species of desert plant. It 

 was a small bush, with cones like a pine cone in 

 shape, growing in clusters, and over stems and cones 

 were fine steel-pointed needles with invisible hooks 

 at the ends. 



A barren, lonely prospect, that flat plateau above, 

 an empire of the sun, where heat veils rose and 

 mirages haunted the eye. But at sunset fog rolled 

 up from the outer channel, and if the sun blasted 

 the life on the island, the fog saved it. So there was 

 war between sun and fog, the one that was the lord 

 of day, and the other the dew-laden savior of night. 



South, on the windward side, opened a wide bay. 

 Smugglers Cove by name, and it was infinitely more 

 beautiful than its name. A great curve indented 

 the league-long slope of island, at each end of which 

 low, ragged lines of black rock jutted out into the 

 sea. Around this immense bare amphitheater, 

 which had no growth save scant cactus and patches 

 of grass, could be seen long lines of shelves where 

 the sea-levels had been in successive ages of the 

 past. 



Near the middle of the curve, on a bleached bank, 

 stood a lonely little hut, facing the sea. Old and 

 weather-beaten, out of place there, it held and fas- 

 cinated the gaze. Below it a white shore-line curved 

 away where the waves rolled in, sadly grand, to 

 break and spread on the beach. 



200 



