le of
the following day in a state of nervous anxiety. We resolved to go
ashore and ramble about the village, as if to observe the habits and
dwellings of the people, as we thought that an air of affected
indifference to the events of the previous day would be more likely than
any other course of conduct to avert suspicion as to our intentions.
While we were thus occupied, the teacher remained on board with the
Christian natives, whose powerful voices reached us ever and anon as
they engaged in singing hymns or in prayer.

At last the long and tedious day came to a close, the sun sank into the
sea, and the short-lived twilight of those regions, to which I have
already referred, ended abruptly in a dark night. Hastily throwing a
few blankets into our little boat, we stepped into it, and whispering
farewell to the natives in the schooner, rowed gently over the lagoon,
taking care to keep as near to the beach as possible. We rowed in the
utmost silence and with muffled oars, so that had any one observed us at
the distance of a few yards, he might have almost taken us for a phantom
boat or a shadow on the dark water. Not a breath of air was stirring;
but fortunately the gentle ripple of the sea upon the shore, mingled
with the soft roar of the breaker on the distant reef, effectually
drowned the slight plash that we unavoidably made in the water by the
dipping of our oars.

A quarter of an hour sufficed to bring us to the overhanging cliff under
whose black shadow our little canoe lay, with her bow in the water,
ready to be launched, and most of her cargo already stowed away. As the
keel of our little boat grated on the sand, a hand was laid upon the
bow, and a dim form was seen.

"Ha!" said Peterkin in a whisper as he stepped upon the beach; "is that
you, Avatea?"

"Yis, it am me," was the reply.

"All right--Now, then, gently--Help me to shove off the canoe,"
whispered Jack to the teacher.--"And, Peterkin, do you shove these
blankets aboard; we may want them before long.--Avatea, step into the
middle: that's right."

"Is all ready?" whispered the teacher.

"Not quite," replied Peterkin.--"Here, Ralph, lay hold o' this pair of
oars, and stow them away if you can. I don't like paddles. After we're
safe away, I'll try to rig up rowlocks for them."

"Now, then, in with you and shove off!"

One more earnest squeeze of the kind teacher's hand, and with his
whispered blessing yet sounding in our ears, we shot