like them, it displayed all the gorgeous beauty of a rich tropical
vegetation. In some places the ground had been cracked and riven into
great fissures and uncouth caverns of the wildest description, by
volcanoes apparently long since extinct. In others the landscape
presented the soft beauty of undulating, grove-like scenery, in which,
amid a profusion of bright green herbage, there rose conspicuous the
tall stems and waving plumes of the cocoanut palm; the superb and
umbrageous ko-a, with its laurel-green leaves and sweet blossoms; the
_kukui_, or candlenut tree; the fragrant sandal-wood, and a variety of
other trees and shrubs for which there are no English names.

Hundreds of green paroquets with blue heads and red breasts,
turtle-doves, wood-pigeons, and other birds enlivened the groves with
sound, if not with melody, and the various lakelets and pools were alive
with wild ducks and water-hens.

The route by which the party traveled led them first across a country of
varied and beautiful aspect; then it conducted them into wild mountain
fastnesses, among which they clambered, at times with considerable
difficulty. Ere long they passed into a dreary region where the ancient
fires that upheaved the island from the deep seemed to have scorched
the land into a condition of perpetual desolation. Blackened and bare
lava rocks, steep volcanic ridges and gorges, irregular truncated cones,
deep-mouthed caves and fissures, overhanging arches, natural bridges,
great tunnels and ravines, surrounded them on every side, and so
concealed the softer features of the country that it was scarcely
possible to believe in the reality of the verdant region out of which
they had just passed. In another hour this chaotic scenery was left
behind; the highest ridge of the mountains was crossed, and the
travelers began to descend the green slopes on the other side of the
island. These slopes terminated in a beach of white sand, while beyond
lay the calm waters of the enclosed lagoon, the coral reef with its
breakers, and the mighty sea.

"'Tis a pretty spot?" said Henry, interrogatively, as the party halted
on the edge of a precipice, whence they obtained an uninterrupted view
of the whole of that side of the island.

"Ay, pretty enough," replied Gascoyne, in a somewhat sad tone of voice:
"I had hoped to have led a quiet life here once, but that was not to be.
How say you, Bumpus; could you make up your mind to cast anchor here for
a ye