This is only the steam rising. Here, Lane,
you have fallen into the right place and can fill the British Museum if
you are industrious."

They were now coming to the end of the barren tract made by the
earthquake wave sweeping the rock in places bare, in others covering the
surface with _debris_ of coral sand, rolled pebble and shell from the
sea; but before reaching the band of verdure which stood at the top of a
slope, they had to pass two or three depressions in which mud and water
still lay, and upon reaching one of these they found to their surprise
that it was _far_ more extensive than they had anticipated. For there
before them stretched acres upon acres of a muddy lagoon, dotted with
islands, and evidently alive with fish swept in from the sea.

"Hi! look-ye there, Billy Wriggs!" cried Smith, excitedly. "See that?"

"Course I can, matey; it's water."

"Well, I know that, stoopid, but look what's in it. Over yonder on that
bank--there close alongside o' that lump o' white rock."

"What of it?" said Wriggs. "Only a trunk of an old tree."

"Ay, four-legged 'un, with a head and tail, having a nap in the
sunshine. Why, it's one o' them eft things as we used to ketch with a
worm in the ponds when we was boys."

"Get out! You go and play tricks with some 'un else, matey," said
Wriggs, contemptuously. "Think I don't know no better than that?"

"You are a clever one, Billy, and no mistake," growled Smith. "I never
did see a chap more ready not to believe the truth. If you hadn't been
born a Christian, mate, nobody wouldn't never have converted you, and
you'd ha' been a regular heathen savage all your days."

"Go it, matey! Much more on it? Let's have it all while you're about
it."

"You shall, Billy, because a good talking to'll do you good, and knock
some o' the wanity out of you. You see, you don't know everything."

"And you do, eh, Tommy?"

"Nay, not quite," said Smith, giving his head a roll; "but I do know as
that's one o' the same sort o' things as I used to see lying in the mud
as I was once going up to Calcutta. That's a halligator, matey, on'y
some folks calls the big uns crockydiles, and the niggers out there
muggers, 'cause they've got such ugly mugs."

"What! do you mean to tell me as that log o' wood with the rough bark on
it's alive?"

"Yes, all alive O!"

"Get out," cried Wriggs, scrutinising the brute searchingly as it lay
about fifty yards away. "That there's a trunk o