he trap. If we kill one of these people, their countrymen
may assemble at the entrance, and slaughter every one of us."

This silenced Golding. We pull some way up the lagoon. The water
swarms with fish, and the shore seems more fertile than any of the coral
islands we have visited. In all directions we see signs of inhabitants,
and in some places small canoes hauled up, but none approach us. We now
pull back towards the passage by which we entered; but the tide still
runs in like a mill-stream. Suddenly we run aground. The men jump out
and lift the boat off. We are in a wrong channel. We at length get
into what we believe to be the right passage. The men track the boat
along, but we make little way. Night comes on rapidly. There will be a
moon, but it has not yet risen, and without its light we cannot escape.
We secure the boat to the rock, and wait anxiously for that time. Few
of us can sleep, for we know not any moment whether the savages may be
upon us. Both Taro and Charlie declare, from what they saw on shore,
that the people are cannibals. There was also the remains of a wreck
burnt on the beach, and they declare their belief that some ship has
been cast away there, and the unfortunate crew destroyed. We wait
anxiously. Golding says very little; he is evidently ill at ease. I
write it, not to boast, but my own mind is far more at ease; for I can
say, "In God put I my trust: I will not fear what man can do unto me."
Thus, through God's grace, I have always been allowed to feel when in
positions of great peril. My shipmates I have heard speak of me as the
bravest man among them. So I verily believe I am; but then I am brave
not in my own strength, but in the strength of Him who is strong to
save. There would be many more brave men in the world, if all knew on
whom they may leap confidently for support. There is a kind of bravery
that is natural to some, and is a constitutional fearlessness; but a far
higher and surer courage belongs to those who have committed their souls
to their God and Saviour, and who feel that whatever may befall them,
when in the way of duty, must be for the best.

These thoughts pass through my mind as I keep watch while the men are
sleeping around me. Still the night continues dark; but as I peep
through the obscurity, I fancy that I see against the sky some objects
flitting here and there over the rocks. I step cautiously back into the
boat, rouse up the men, who se