stream leaped
and raced along in its course down to the sea to the westwards beyond.
The river, we could now see, when we had more leisure to contemplate it,
came from a little cataract or waterfall that sprang down a niche in the
rocks at the point where two gorges met, and if we had gone half a mile
further to the eastward we must have missed it. Providence surely
guided our steps that day, for I'm certain we could not have lived
another twenty-four hours without water, nay, not twelve!

"As soon as our thirst was appeased, all of us began to feel ravenously
hungry; the men, to my eyes, seeming by the looks they were casting at
each other as if they would turn cannibals if no other proper food
turned up. Glancing about the little glade where we were resting, I
fortunately saw just by the side of the streamlet some lace-like leaves
of a climbing plant which resembled very much what I knew in the West
Indies as the water yam--a very good vegetable that serves the niggers
there instead of our potato, and indeed some folks, myself included,
like it better than that even, when roasted, with lots of butter on it.

"I told Jem of this; and he, fortunately having his knife with him slung
on to the lanyard round his trouser band--he was the only one of us that
had a weapon of any sort--at once began to dig about the roots of the
plants, soon dragging out from the ground a large bulb something like an
elongated beet-root. It was the water yam, sure enough. I recognised
it the moment I looked at it, and I was glad that the leaf had attracted
my attention; so, telling Jem it was all right, he at once sliced it up
into six pieces and shared it out to us. I can't say it tasted nice,
being raw; but it was something in the food line at any rate, and we ate
it all ravenously, the same as we would have eaten the leather of our
boots if we had any.

"Jem Magellan dug out three more yams, one of which he shared out in the
same way and which was just as quickly demolished; but the two others he
reserved for the next day, in case we should not chance to come across
any more plants. Then, we had another good drink of water, which tasted
not the less sweet the more we had of it; and as the sun was now setting
we turned in for the night by the bank of the stream, intending to stay
there a bit until we had recruited ourselves after all the exhausting
privation and terribly hard work we had experienced in getting through
the bush since