amid such scenes feels that
he is so much nearer to the arm of God than those who dwell in uniform
security, as to think less of ordinary advantages than is common.

Mark knew that there must have been a dislocation of the rocks, to
produce such a change as that he saw to the southward. It was well for
him it occurred there at a distance, as he then thought, of ten or
fifteen miles from the Reef, though in truth it was at quite fifty,
instead of happening beneath him. It was possible, however, for one to
have been on the top of that mountain, and to have lived through the
late change, could the lungs of man have breathed the atmosphere. Not
far from this mountain a column of smoke rose out of the sea, and Mark
fancied that, at moments, he could discern the summit of an active
crater at its base.

After gazing at these astonishing changes for a long time, our young man
descended from the height and retraced his steps homeward. Kitty gladly
preceded him, and some time after the sun had set, they regained the
Reef. About a mile short of home, Mark passed all the hogs, snugly
deposited in a bed of mud, where they had esconced themselves for the
night, as one draws himself beneath his blanket.

Chapter XII.

"All things in common nature should produce
Without sweat or endeavour: treason, felony,
Sword, pike, gun, or need of any engine
Would I not have; but nature should bring forth
Of its own kind, all foizen, all abundance
To feed my innocent people."

_Tempest._

For the next ten days Mark Woolston did little but explore. By crossing
the channel around the Reef, which he had named the 'Armlet' (the young
man often talked to himself), he reached the sea-wall, and, once there,
he made a long excursion to the eastward. He now walked dryshod over
those very reefs among which he had so recently sailed in the Bridget,
though the ship-channel through which he and Bob had brought in the
Rancocus still remained. The two buoys that had marked the narrow
passage were found, high and dry; and the anchor of the ship, that by
which she rode after beating over the rocks into deep water, was to be
seen so near the surface, that the stock could be reached by the hand.

There was little difference in character between the newly-made land to
windward and that which Mark had found in the opposite direction. Large
pools, or lakes, of salt water, deposits of mud and sand, some of which
were of c