dger with
the Wooden Leg was the last, and one of the pirates returned for him.
When he had followed the others, the great half-dark chamber remained as
it had been before, in its empty solitude and gloom, without an ear to
hear the steady rush of water pouring incessantly down its fall.

On the outer side of that rushing fall was a scene very different
indeed. The pirates and their captives stood under a blazing sun,
looking across a wide and beautiful landscape. Behind them, in the side
of a high hill overgrown with bushes, was the hole by which they had
come forth, and across the inside of this hole was the curtain of
falling water. Freddie wondered how anyone had ever had the courage to
plunge for the first time through that curtain into the unknown dark.
The heat of the sun was very grateful, and the clothing of the soaked
travellers began to dry perceptibly at once. The pirates took off their
rubber suits.

Beneath the observers the ground sloped down into a broad valley,
chequered with grass meadows and dotted with trees. To their left, as
they gazed out across the landscape, the ground rose from the valley by
easy stages to a great height, no doubt forming the landward side of the
black cliff which bordered the ocean.

To the right, the country rolled gently away from the valley in a vast
unbroken forest, a shimmering green ocean of tree-tops as far as the eye
could see. Far, far off where the forest rose in a kind of mound,
Freddie thought he could see what looked like the top of a round tower,
just emerging above the haze of trees.

The pirates and their captives were standing on a little grassy plateau,
on which were great boulders here and there, and a few wide leafy trees.
Two or three fallen logs were lying near the edge of the plateau, where
it began to slope downward.

Captain Lingo stepped out of his rubber suit, spread out his fine white
handkerchief on a boulder to dry, and twiddled his moist fingers
daintily in the air, after which he blew on his finger-nails and
polished them on his shirt-sleeves.

"We are now ready," said he, "for the ceremony. Ketch, thy cutlass."

Ketch drew his cutlass from his belt and handed it to the captain. It
glittered wickedly in the sunlight. The captain ran his thumb along its
edge, and nodded his head with satisfaction.

"It will do," said he. "One stroke for each will be quite sufficient.
We will now proceed with the ceremony."

He restored the cutlass to t