rst break of day revealed the sextons that had
scared her--three ponderous turtles, crawling, slow and clumsy, back to
sea. Hazel joined her, and they soon found what these evil spirits of the
island had been at, poor wretches. They had each buried a dozen eggs in
the sand; one dozen of which were very soon set boiling. At first,
indeed, Helen objected that they had no shells, but Hazel told her she
might as well complain of a rose without a thorn. He assured her turtles'
eggs were a known delicacy, and very superior to birds' eggs; and so she
found them. They were eaten with the keenest relish.

"And now," said Helen, "for my discoveries. First, here are my English
leaves, only bigger. I found them on a large tree."

"English leaves!" cried Hazel, with rapture. "Why, it is the caoutchouc!"

"Oh, dear," said Helen, in a disappointed tone; "I took it for the
India-rubber free."

"It is the India-rubber tree; and I have been hunting for it all over the
island in vain, and using wretchedly inferior gums for want of it."

"I'm so glad," said Helen. "And now I have something else to show you.
Something that curdled my blood; but I dare say I was very foolish." She
then took him half across the sand and pointed out to him a number of
stones dotted over the sand in a sort of oval. These stones, streaked
with sea grass, and incrusted with small shells, were not at equal
distances, but yet, allowing for gaps, they formed a decided figure.
Their outline resembled a great fish, wanting the tail.

"Can this be chance?" asked Helen; "oh, if it should be what I fear, and
that is--savages!"

Hazel considered it attentively a long time. "Too far at sea for living
savages," said he. "And yet it cannot be chance. What on earth is it? It
looks Druidical. But how can that be? The island was smaller when these
were placed here than it is now." He went nearer and examined one of the
stones; then he scraped away the sand from its base, and found it was not
shaped like a stone, but more like a whale's rib. He became excited; went
on his knees, and tore the sand up with his hands. Then he rose up
agitated, and traced the outline again. "Great Heaven!" said he, "why, it
is a ship."

"A ship!"

"Ay," said he, standing in the middle of it; "here, beneath our feet,
lies man; with his work, and his treasures. This carcass has been here
for many a long year; not so very long, either; she is too big for the
sixteenth century, and yet she mus