appeared, there's no
use in our standing here any longer looking at the sea. Suppose we
begin to make ourselves at home and arrange our things in the snug
little cottage which our good friends have built for us?"

"Right you are!" responded Eric, starting off towards the cliff, under
the lee of which the Tristaner had directed the hut to be built, so that
it might be sheltered from the strong winds of the winter, which would
soon have blown it down had it been erected in a more exposed situation.

Fritz followed more leisurely to the level plateau by the waterfall,
where stood their cottage.

Here, arresting his footsteps, he remained a moment surveying the little
domain before joining his brother, who had already rushed within the
building.

That boy was all impulse: always eager to be doing something!

The territory of the young crusoes was of limited dimensions. Extending
about a mile laterally, it was bounded on either side by lofty headlands
that projected into the sea, enclosing the narrow strip of beach that
lay between in their twin arms. The depth of the valley inwards was
even more confined by a steep cliff, down whose abrupt face slipped and
hopped through a gorge, or gully, a little rivulet. This stream, on its
progress being arrested by a shelf in front of the rocky escarpment,
tumbled over the obstacle in a sheet of cloud-like spray, being thus
converted into a typical "waterfall" that resembled somewhat that of
Staubbach, as the brothers had noticed when making their first
observations from the ship. The rivulet, collecting its scattered
fragments below, made its way to the beach in a meandering course,
passing by in its passage the slight hollow in the plateau at the base
of the furthermost crag, close by where the cottage was situated.

The "location," as Captain Brown would have termed the sloping ground
between the cliff and the sea, was certainly not an extensive one; for,
in the event of their wishing to expand their little settlement, in the
fashion of squatters out West, by "borrowing" land from adjacent lots,
the inexorable wall of volcanic rock to the rear of the plateau and on
its right and left flank forbade the carrying out of any such scheme;
still, the place was big enough for their house, besides affording room
for a tidy-sized garden--that is, when the two had time to dig up the
soil and plant the potatoes and other seed which the skipper had
provided them with, so that they mi