orn and the Cape of Good Hope--from the latter of
which they are distant some fifteen hundred miles in a westerly
direction, while Saint Helena, the nearest other land to them on the
north, is thirteen hundred miles away."

"You're very explicit, I'm sure," said Fritz in a chaffing way; "you
must have been coaching up your geography recently."

"I disdain vulgar interruption and idle clamour," returned the other in
a similar vein. "But, to proceed. The group consists of the larger
island of Tristan and two smaller islands--Inaccessible Island, some
eighteen miles to the south-west, and Nightingale Island, twenty miles
to the south. These islands are uninhabited, save by penguins and
seals; but an interesting little colony of some eighty souls occupies
Tristan, breeding cattle and cultivating vegetables, with which they
supply passing vessels, mostly whalers--these calling there from time to
time, on their way to and from their fishing grounds in the great
Southern Ocean."

"Your account is highly interesting, my dear Eric," said Fritz, when his
brother had completed this exhaustive description of the Tristan
d'Acunha group; "still, I confess I do not see in what way it affects
me."

"Don't you?"

"No."

"Then you will soon; listen a moment longer. I told you that, with the
exception of the larger one, these islands are uninhabited save by the
penguins and seals and such-like marine animals."

"Yes, you've told me that; and I don't wonder at it when they are
situated so remotely from all civilisation."

"That fact has its advantages none the less," proceeded Eric. "Being so
cut off from communication with men makes these islands just the
favourite resort of those animals that shun the presence of their
destroyers. Seals, as you know, are very nervous, retiring creatures
seeking their breeding-places in the most out-of-the-way, deserted spots
they can find; and the advance of the human race, planting colonies
where the poor things had formerly undisputed sway around the shores of
the South American continent, has driven them further and further
afield, or rather to sea, until they are now only to be met with in any
numbers in the Antarctic Ocean, and such islands as lie adjacent to that
great Southern continent which has never yet been discovered--although
Lord Ross pretty nearly put foot on it, if any explorer can be said to
have done that."

"Really, Eric," exclaimed Fritz jokingly, "you surpass yourse