Palm Tree Island

by Herbert Strang

  CHAPTER THE SIXTH

  OF OUR SEARCH FOR SUSTENANCE AND SHELTER; WITH VARIOUS MATTERS OF MORECONSEQUENCE TO THE CASTAWAY THAN EXCITEMENT TO THE READER

  This little adventure with the pigs was, I verily believe, the means ofsaving us from the lethargy into which we had like to have been cast bybrooding on our solitude. The knowledge that there were on our islandanimals that might be formidable, and were certainly good for food,proved to us at once the necessity of being watchful, and of settingour wits to work to devise a means of cooking. And a thing thathappened the same night showed to us that if we were to make the bestof our situation, and have any comfort in our solitary life, we musttake some measures for our shelter.

  [Sidenote: A Storm]

  This event was nothing less than a violent storm of wind and rain whichsprang up suddenly in the middle of the night. We had returned to ourfirst shelter, the make-shift hut, or rather lean-to, which we hadconstructed of boughs and leaves around a great tree. The wind brokethis down utterly, scattering the materials of it far and wide, and therain drenched us to the skin, or I should say, soaked us to the bone,we having no garments but our shirts and breeches. That night was themost miserable of all my life, I assure you. We huddled together forshelter under the thickest trees, listening to the howling of the wind,and sometimes hearing great crashing noises that made us fear almost toremain under shelter at all, lest the trees should fall upon our headsand kill us. Never a wink of sleep had we that night, and whendaylight came, we staggered forth from the wood, two shiveringmiserable mortals, who would have given the world for a roaring fireand a hot posset to comfort us.

  We needed not to climb trees for our breakfast, for the wind hadstrewed the ground with cocoanuts, and had indeed uprooted many trees,one of which had narrowly missed the very spot where we had lain. Aswe ate our food, very wretched, we considered how we were to constructsome sort of hut, in case another storm should visit us. There wastimber in plenty, but neither Billy nor I had any knowledge of sawyers'or carpenters' work; nor if we had should we have been much better off,having no tool save the rough axe of Billy's fashioning. Necessity,they say, is the mother of invention, and so it proved in our case, aswill be seen more fully hereafter.

  After breakfast the first thing that Billy did was to try his axe onone of the big fallen trees. He was able after very great labour--Itaking my turns when he was tired--to lop some of the branches off, butthe flint was so much blunted by it that we saw it would serve uslittle longer. Accordingly we set off up the mountain-side to findother flints of which to make axe-heads, and on this little expeditionwe were followed by the pack of dogs, which watched our proceedings asif they took a great interest in them, but always remained at areasonable distance. By midday we had collected a fair number ofsharp-edged flints, small and big, and Billy having made me an axe likehis own--he would not let me do it, saying that he was sure he couldmake a better one than me--we felt a deal more comfortable both in bodyand mind, being satisfied that we should not lack tools, though rough,and our clothes being dried with the sun. Indeed, we found the sunrather oppressive, especially upon our bare heads, and we wished veryheartily that our hats had been spared to us; coats we could do withoutin the daytime, though they would have been a great solace o' nights.

  [Sidenote: Plans]

  Having thus furnished ourselves with axes, we had to determine the sitefor the hut we purposed building, and we talked very seriously aboutthis when we had eaten our dinner.

  "One thing is sure," says Billy; "we must build it a good way from theold smoker" (so he called the mountain, above which we observed that acloud of steam had again gathered, though it had been clear yesterday).If remoteness from the mountain had been the only point to beconsidered, we might have been content with the wood in which we hadmade our lean-to; but after our experience in the storm we did notregard it as suitable for a permanent habitation when it might beshattered any day or night. It was certain we could not build on thoseparts of the island that were bare rock, for we could not by any meansdig foundations in it, and a hut without foundations, in an exposedplace, might be carried away in a hurricane, and hurled into the sea,and we in it. And then it came into my mind that if we built too highupon the island, our dwelling might be spied by the savages of theneighbouring islands of which I have spoken, for we could not doubtthat they were inhabited, and the people would certainly put to seasometimes in their canoes. This set me on thinking that it would bewell to make our dwelling less a house than a fortress, in which wecould take refuge in case savages should at any time land upon ourisland. It seemed to me, then, that we ought to seek for a remotespot, very hard of access, and bethinking me of such a spot which I hadseen in our course towards the north-east, I had almost resolved tochoose that spot when I recollected all at once that there was no waterin that neighbourhood, which was a very serious matter. Indeed, thislack of water gave us much concern, for as yet we had found none butwhat smacked of brimstone, and Billy said that we didn't needphysicking every day, nor yet every week. We spent the rest of thatday, therefore, in roaming over the island once more in search of freshwater, and made a more thorough exploration of the western end, inwhich the vegetation was wilder than in the other woodland parts.There was never a spring that we could see, and we should have had oursearch for nothing but for a discovery that Billy made. He had climbeda bare and very rough hillock, just beyond a patch of wood at thesouth-west corner of the island, and I saw him suddenly stoop, and whenhe rose to the erect posture he held something white in his hand, andbegan to caper with every token of delight. Then he came running downtowards me, and shouted a word that sounded like "aig! aig!" whichpuzzled me exceedingly, until when he came close to me and opened hishand I saw what was certainly the likest to a hen's egg that I had everbeheld, and concluded that "aig!" was the manner of calling it atLimehouse. I could scarce believe it was indeed a hen's egg, for wehad seen no fowls save those I have mentioned before, nor had we heard,amid the noises of the island, the clarion voice of any cock; yet itwas like nothing else, and Billy declared with great positiveness thatthere must be roosters, as he called them, on the island, whose eggswould form an agreeable addition to our fare.

  [Sidenote: Eggs]

  He was not by any means cast down when I said that we had no fire forcooking, avouching that he had sucked 'em raw many a time, but addedthat this being the first egg we had found, it belonged by right to meas king of the island (so he called me in sport), and he would at onceset about making a fire, as he had often said he would do, and roast itfor me, we having no pan for boiling. When he spoke of boiling, Iremembered all of a sudden the spring of hot water we had seen on theother side of the mountain, and thought it might very well serve tocook the egg; so we made all haste to that spot, Billy saying that ifthe water would cook an egg, it would also cook pig, and boiled porkwas very good, though not so good as roast. We came to the spring, andlaid the egg in the bottom of a cup-shaped hollow through which itflowed, and having neither watch nor sand-glass, Billy set himselfpatiently to count the seconds as well as he could, saying that the eggmust not be overdone nor underdone, but boiled just proper.

  "We will give it four minutes, master," says he, "instead of three,'cos we ain't sure the water is on the boil, not what you would callreal boiling."

  Accordingly, the four minutes being expired (though I think he missedcount when just past a hundred and fifty), he took out the egg and,breaking the shell at one end, gave it to me to taste, which I did, butinstantly spat it out of my mouth, and cast the egg down upon therocks, bespattering them with white and yellow. I told Billy with muchspluttering that the egg was addled, and indeed the taste of it wasvery foul, and remained in my mouth a long time, till, having returnedto our wood, I cured it with a copious draught of cocoa-nut juice, theacid of which was very grateful. Billy was much cast down at thisunfortunate beginning of his cookery, and wanted to go instantly andkill a sucking-pig; but since it was already growing late, and would
bedark ere he could go and come and finish cooking, even if he found apig at once and caught it without trouble, I persuaded him to returnwith me to the wood, where we had to rig up another shelter for thenight, in place of the one that had been shattered by the storm.

  I will say here that we found more eggs afterwards, always in placesthat were hard to get at--on ledges in the land side of the cliffs, andin hollows of rocky eminences; and though we for some time saw no fowlsand were much puzzled in consequence, we discovered by and by that theyroosted high up in the trees, and concluded that they did this to takerefuge from the rats and dogs, and kept silence for the same reason.There were very few of them on the island, their broods being no doubtmuch preyed upon when young and unable to fly.

  I had almost forgot to mention a strange discovery we made while wewere yet on the mountain. It chanced that Billy, prodding the groundwith his axe, dislodged a lump of rock which rolled down into thespring, and had no sooner touched the water than it set up a greathissing noise, and we saw a cloud of dirty yellow smoke rise up from itinto the air, with such a horrible stench that we choked and coughed,and ran away to some distance until the fizzing and smoking ceased. Ihad never seen or heard of the like before, and as for Billy, he saidthat Old Smoker was worse than he thought him, carrying such poisonousstuff in his inside. This made us careful how we trod, for we did notknow but there might be rocks of other kinds, which might "go off," asBilly said, when we touched them. However, we did not find any such,and we almost forgot about the fizzy rock, as Billy called it, until atime came when we discovered a use for it.

  [Sidenote: The First Hut]

  To come back to the matter of our house. Having sought in vain for asuitable site in the rougher parts of the island, we went down next dayto the lake-side, where we should at least be within reach of water,though unpalatable. We found that the lake was very much swelled withthe recent heavy rains, and the water was not near so clear asformerly, though it was much less nauseous to the taste, and we had agood drink of it without suffering any ill effects. This quitedetermined us in our choice, for we supposed that it would rain veryfrequently, as in England, so that the lake would be constantlyreplenished and the sulphurous character of its water be thusqualified. We found in course of time that rain did not fall near sooften as in England, though usually much heavier; and that the effecton the lake was not quite so great as we expected, at least in regardto the taste, for the many rills and rivulets that carried water fromthe high parts of the island ran over sulphurous soil, some of whichthey washed down into the lake.

  Our Flint Scraper for Sharpening Axes]

  Being set on building a substantial house, or rather fortress, as Isaid, we saw that with our rude tools it would take us a very longtime, and so we first took in hand to make a small hut which wouldshelter us while the other was a-building. This we determined to placeat the edge of the wood above the lake, and we found much material inthe trees which had been uprooted in the storm, and in young straightsaplings which we could either pull up, the soil being thin, or cutdown with our stone axes. These axes of ours soon became blunt, but wefound a means to sharpen them by whetting on the hard rocks by theshore, and it became our constant practice to begin each day withbathing in the sea, and then sharpening our axes, which sharpened ourappetites also, I do assure you. Having got a sufficiency of theseslender poles for our walls, we stuck them in holes which we made withour axes, and held them together with tendrils of the creeping plantsthat grew very plentifully in the woods. We thus made walls about tenfeet high, about a space twelve feet square, and it was not until thewalls were up that we began to consider of how to put a roof to them,having no ladders nor any means of mounting to such a height. Thismade us see how needful it was to take thought beforehand, though wenever succeeded in foreseeing all the difficulties that we should meetwith, and I suppose no one ever did. All we could do about this roofof ours was to carry up small rocks from the shore, and pile these oneon another until we made a stand high enough for us to lay saplingsfrom wall to wall. Since it was clear that this roof would protect usbut little, the rain being able to come through the interstices, we putup stands of rocks inside the hut, and supported on these we made shiftto weave grasses and creepers among the poles, finding it very hardwork, and very long too, we having to take the stands down and buildthem up again as we moved from place to place in the hut. As for thewalls, we filled up the interstices in them with earth from thehill-side above us, which we found to be of a clayey sort, and soonhardened in the sun, though after a little it began to crack andcrumble. We carried this earth in our hands, a very troublesome andslow manner of doing it, but we had no vessels, nor did we at that timethink of making any.

  This hut took us above a week in building, at least I think so, forafter the first day or two we neglected to take any account of thepassage of time. It was a poor sort of thing when finished, and couldnot have stood against a hurricane; but the weather was very fair, andbesides, the place we had chosen was not near so much exposed as ourfirst habitation, on higher ground. We hoped it would serve us untilwe should have made our proposed fortress, and the building of it wasexceeding useful to us, for it took up, with the getting and eating ofour food, every minute of the daytime, and by keeping our thoughtsbusy, as well as our hands, hindered us from dwelling on our loneliness.

  I had almost forgot to mention two or three things: first, that everymorning and evening one or other of us went up the mountain-side, to aspot whence we had sight of the sea all around, to spy whether a sailwas visible. The second thing is, that Billy went out one day, andbrought back a little sucking-pig, which he had killed with his axe.We cut off its hinder legs, and carried them to the hot spring, andfound that they cooked very well; and though the meat had a slightsavour of brimstone, it was vastly more agreeable than the salt junk wewere used to have aboard ship. Indeed, Billy said that it only wantedpease-pudding to make a meal fit for a king, and he ran all the way tothe wood and back again to fetch a bread-fruit, to see if that, whenboiled, would supply the place of pease; but the fruit only boiled to apap, and when Billy tasted it, he declared that it spoiled the flavourof the pork, so we ate the meat by itself.

  [Sidenote: Failure]

  This failure made Billy determine again to try his hand at making fire,which we had no time for when building our little hut. He picked up astraight twig, that seemed to promise well for his purpose, andsharpening his flint axe, he peeled the twig and cut it so as to make astick about a foot long, one end of which he brought to a point. But,finding the wood too soft for the use to which he designed it, he wentprowling about to discover a tree hard enough, testing them with hisaxe, and after a long search, lighted upon a tree that was very hard,and whose sap was of a blood-red colour.[1] Having cut a stick ofthis, he sharpened one end to a point, and then took two chunks ofwood, one of a soft kind, the other of the new-discovered tree, whichwe called redwood, and in each of these chunks he made a little hollow,one in the soft wood for the sharp end of the stick, the other for theblunt. Then, fitting the stick into these hollows, he gave me allthree pieces of wood to hold, and while I held them tightly clampedtogether, he began to twirl the stick between his hands as fast as hecould, as he had seen the savages do, though often they used abowstring. He continued this for a good while, until his hands, hardas they were, grew sore and his face was running with sweat; butwhether that the wood was damp, or that Billy was not dexterous enough,I know not, only that there was never a sign of smouldering, though thewood was hot when we felt it. Billy insisted that I should take aturn, which I did, and twirled the stick even faster, I believe, thanhe did, though not so long; but it was all no good, and at last wethrew the wood from us, concluding that if we were to obtain fire, itmust be in some other way. I do not mean that we never tried thenative way again: we were not so easily discouraged; we tried more thanonce in the intervals of doing other things, and I think that withperseverance we might have succeeded at last, only it was notneces
sary, as will be seen hereafter.

  [Sidenote: Building Materials]

  This failure, though it annoyed us at the time, was of use to us,inasmuch as it set us on noticing

  [1] This appears to have been what botanists call _Rhizophoramucronata_.--H.S.