there's nothing to watch for."

"Not for the wave that may come and carry us back to sea?"

"No; that would be too long a watch, sir. Such an eruption as we have
encountered only comes once in a man's lifetime. I'm in command now,
and I shall let every poor fellow have ten or a dozen hours' good sleep,
and I am so utterly done up that I shall take the same amount myself."

The consequence was that all through that natural darkness of night dead
silence reigned.

But not for ten or a dozen hours. Before eight of them were passed,
Oliver Lane was awake and on deck, eager and excited with all a
naturalist's love of the wild world, to see what their novel
surroundings would be like.

The sun was shining brilliantly; low down in the east the sky was
golden, and as he raised his head above the hatchway, it was to gaze
over the bulwarks at a glorious vista of green waving trees, on many of
which were masses of scarlet and yellow blossom; birds were flying in
flocks, screaming and shrieking; while from the trees came melodious
pipings, and the trills of finches, mingled with deep-toned, organ-like
notes, and the listener felt his heart swell with thankfulness, and a
mist came before his eyes, as he felt how gloriously beautiful the world
seemed, after the black darkness and horrors through which he had
passed.

Then everything was matter-of-fact and ordinary again, for a voice
said,--"Hullo! you up? Thought I was first."

"You, Drew? I say, look here." Sylvester Drew, botanist of the little
expedition, shaded his eyes from the horizontal sunbeams, and looked
round over the hatchway as he stood beside his companion, and kept on
uttering disconnected words,--"Beautiful--grand--Paradise--thank God!"
By one impulse they stepped on deck and went to the bulwarks, to stand
there and look around, astounded at the change.

From where they had obtained their first glimpse of their surroundings
they only saw the higher ground; now they were looking upon the level--a
scene of devastation.

For they were both gazing upon the track of the earthquake wave, and all
around them trees were lying torn-up by the roots, battered and stripped
of their leafage, some piled in inextricable confusion, others half
buried in mud. Some again had soft white coral sand heaped over them.
Here, the surface had been swept bare to the dark rock which formed the
base of the island or continent upon which they had been cast; there,
mud lay in sl