lla for an hour,
making his observations, before he left it. This was clearly a war
party, and Bob thought there were white men in it. At least, he saw two
individuals who appeared to him to be white sailors, attired in a
semi-savage way, and who were in the same canoe with the terrible
Waally. It was nothing out of the way for seamen to get adrift on the
islands scattered about in the Pacific, there being scarcely a group in
which more or less of them are not to be found. The presence of these
men, too, Bob regarded as another evil omen, and he felt the necessity
of throwing all the dust he could into their eyes. When the pinnace left
the flotilla, therefore, instead of passing out to windward of the
island, as was her true course, she steered in an almost contrary
direction, keeping off well to leeward of the land, in order not to get
becalmed under the heights, for Bob well knew the canoes, with paddles,
would soon overhaul him, should he lose the wind.

It was the practice of our colonists to quit Rancocus just before the
sun set, and to stand all night on a south-east course. This invariably
brought them in sight of the smoke of the volcano by morning, and
shortly after they made the Peak. All of the day that succeeded, was
commonly passed in beating up to the volcano, or as near to it as it was
thought prudent to go; and tacking to the northward and eastward, about
sunset of the second day, it was found on the following morning, that
the Neshamony was drawing near to the cliffs of Vulcan's Peak, if she
were not already beneath them. As a matter of course, then, Bob had not
far to go, before night shut in, and left him at liberty to steer in
whatever direction he pleased. Fortunately, that night had no moon,
though there was not much danger of so small a craft as the Neshamony
being seen at any great distance on the water, even by moonlight. Bob
consequently determined to beat up off the north end of the island, or
Low Cape, as it was named by the colonists, from the circumstance of its
having a mile or two of low land around it, before the mountains
commenced. Once off the cape again, and reasonably well in, he might
possibly make discoveries that would be of use.

It took two or three hours to regain the lost ground, by beating to
windward. By eleven o'clock, however, the Neshamony was not only off the
cape, but quite close in with the landing. The climate rendering fires
altogether unnecessary at that season, a