CHAPTER III. 



WE ARE SUSPECTED OF GUN-RUNNING. 



One morning, the uneventful tenour and the peaceful 

 privacy of our little island received a rude shock ; and 

 the shock caused us nearly as much surprise as the advent 

 of the cannibals must have done to Robinson Crusoe. 



We were returning from an early visit to the parrot 

 wood, with collecting bags laden with spoil, and had just 

 reached the top of the ridge, whence the ground slopes 

 gradually down to the southern coast. From here, one's 

 eye could rove east and west along the whole extent of 

 shore-line; where rock-bound promontories alternated 

 with the broad sweep of sand -fringed bays ; and where, 

 ever and anon, the vivid green of mangrove swamps 

 spreads inwards to the land like some invading cancer. 

 Right and left of us, the ground swept away in undulating 

 folds or gently sculptured valleys, where cactus and mimosa 

 scrub struggled for the mastery. Dotted here and there 

 were huge heaps of granite boulders, looking as if they had 

 been dumped down by some Cyclopean hand. 



No faintest indication of human habitation marred the 

 peculiar charm of this wild island picture ; where for ages 

 wind and rain have striven to soften down the asperities 

 of Nature and to prepare the way for a richer vegetation 

 struggling to assert itself. Before us lay the Caribbean, 

 stretching away to the south, where it was lost in the 

 infinite blue of the sky. Beneath us was our httle cove, 

 where the masts of the yacht showed up above the green 

 of the manchineel trees. 



