engineer silent for the most part, and only stepping
aside to pick up one thing or another, a mineral or vegetable substance,
which he put into his pocket, without making any remark.

"What can he be picking up?" muttered Pencroft. "I have looked in vain
for anything that's worth the trouble of stooping for."

Towards ten o'clock the little band descended the last declivities of
Mount Franklin. As yet the ground was scantily strewn with bushes and
trees. They were walking over yellowish calcinated earth, forming a
plain of nearly a mile long, which extended to the edge of the wood.
Great blocks of that basalt, which, according to Bischof, takes three
hundred and fifty millions of years to cool, strewed the plain, very
confused in some places. However, there were here no traces of lava,
which was spread more particularly over the northern slopes.

Cyrus Harding expected to reach, without incident, the course of the
creek, which he supposed flowed under the trees at the border of the
plain, when he saw Herbert running hastily back, while Neb and the
sailor were hiding behind the rocks.

"What's the matter, my boy?" asked Spilett.

"Smoke," replied Herbert. "We have seen smoke among the rocks, a hundred
paces from us."

"Men in this place?" cried the reporter.

"We must avoid showing ourselves before knowing with whom we have to
deal," replied Cyrus Harding. "I trust that there are no natives on this
island; I dread them more than anything else. Where is Top?"

"Top is on before."

"And he doesn't bark?"

"No."

"That is strange. However, we must try to call him back."

In a few moments, the engineer, Gideon Spilett, and Herbert had rejoined
their two companions, and like them, they kept out of sight behind the
heaps of basalt.

From thence they clearly saw smoke of a yellowish color rising in the
air.

Top was recalled by a slight whistle from his master, and the latter,
signing to his companions to wait for him, glided away among the
rocks. The colonists, motionless, anxiously awaited the result of this
exploration, when a shout from the engineer made them hasten forward.
They soon joined him, and were at once struck with a disagreeable odor
which impregnated the atmosphere.

The odor, easily recognized, was enough for the engineer to guess what
the smoke was which at first, not without cause, had startled him.

"This fue," said he, "or rather, this smoke is produced by nature alone.
There is a sulp