ed
to compromise his own safety by any rash endeavour to ensure mine.
But the plan he had suggested struck me as one which might possibly be
accomplished, and I resolved to act upon it as speedily as possible.

Accordingly, when he arose to depart, I accompanied him with the natives
outside of the house, with a view of carefully noting the path he
would take in leaving the valley. Just before leaping from the pi-pi he
clasped my hand, and looking significantly at me, exclaimed, 'Now you
see--you do what I tell you--ah! then you do good;--you no do so--ah!
then you die.' The next moment he waved his spear to the islanders, and
following the route that conducted to a defile in the mountains lying
opposite the Happar side, was soon out of sight.

A mode of escape was now presented to me, but how was I to avail myself
of it? I was continually surrounded by the savages; I could not stir
from one house to another without being attended by some of them; and
even during the hours devoted to slumber, the slightest movement which I
made seemed to attract the notice of those who shared the mats with me.
In spite of these obstacles, however, I determined forthwith to make the
attempt. To do so with any prospect of success, it was necessary that
I should have at least two hours start before the islanders should
discover my absence; for with such facility was any alarm spread through
the valley, and so familiar, of course, were the inhabitants with the
intricacies of the groves, that I could not hope, lame and feeble as I
was, and ignorant of the route, to secure my escape unless I had this
advantage. It was also by night alone that I could hope to accomplish my
object, and then only by adopting the utmost precaution.

The entrance to Marheyo's habitation was through a low narrow opening
in its wicker-work front. This passage, for no conceivable reason that I
could devise, was always closed after the household had retired to rest,
by drawing a heavy slide across it, composed of a dozen or more bits of
wood, ingeniously fastened together by seizings of sinnate. When any of
the inmates chose to go outside, the noise occasioned by the removing of
this rude door awakened every body else; and on more than one occasion
I had remarked that the islanders were nearly as irritable as more
civilized beings under similar circumstances.

The difficulty thus placed in my way I, determined to obviate in the
following manner. I would get up boldl