CHAPTER XXXI.

WE BUILD A HUT.

My old tutor at Eton used to say, quoting some "wise saw," that "a lazy boy made a lazy man, just as a crooked sapling makes a crooked tree."

It was fortunate for me, however, while on the island of Alphonso, that my habits were those of activity, and that I was never lymphatic by nature.

After dawn next morning we set about the erection of a hut, though we had no other tools than a small hatchet and our clasp-knives. With these we cut or tore down a great number of large branches, and stuck them in the earth, selecting a place where two angles of impending rock conveniently enough formed two solid walls for our edifice, leaving us but two others to erect.

As Tom Lambourne said, "the fellow who cannot use a hammer or axe, is only _half a man_," so we all worked hard with such implements as we had, until our hut was complete.

We left an entrance next the rocks by which to creep in and out, and then thatched or built over the intertwisted branches with turf, torn up by our hands, and with broad plantain leaves, creepers, and all kinds of tendrils that had toughness and consistency woven to form a roof.

At the erection of this most primitive wigwam we toiled the whole day, save during the scorching interval of noon, and ere nightfall it was complete, with piles of dried leaves and seagrass for couches and bedroom furniture.

Therein we placed all our provisions--the three bags of bread, two kegs of rum (which by unanimous consent were placed under the sole supervision of Hislop); our four casks of water were also brought ashore, though there was no lack of pure springs on the island.

In this wigwam were also placed our blankets, the sails and tackle of the longboat, and then the succeeding days were spent in accumulating provisions (as we looked forward with dread to our last biscuit), and a signal-post was erected on the mountain.

With Probart the carpenter, and Henry Warren (two of our stoutest hands), Tom Lambourne and I went upon this duty.

Alternately carrying on our shoulders or dragging in our hands the studding-sail boom, we toiled through wild and untrodden wastes, toward the summit of the great and yet nameless conical mountain that rears its lonely scalp to the height of five thousand feet above the waves of the Southern sea.

The hope that on reaching its summit we _might_ descry a sail, was an additional incentive to toil up the steep slope without lingering by the way.

On leaving a flat savanna of sedge-grass we reached a series of wooded ridges which form the base of the mountain, at every step rousing clouds of birds, especially a species of blackcock, and twice in the jungle we came upon the lair of wild boars of great size and such ferocity of aspect that we were glad to shrink astern of Tattooed Tom, who carried the hatchet.

This jungle was exceedingly difficult of penetration, owing to its density, the number of wild aloes, with creeping plants, prickly pears, and other tropical weeds, of what kind I know not, twined about them. It was a literal wilderness of serrated grass blades, yellow gourds, and great squashy pumpkins like gigantic vegetable marrows, all woven into an inextricable network of leaves, tendrils, and branches.

In other places we had to force a passage through thickets of richly flowered shrubs and tall plants with mighty leaves, the general greenery of the landscape being increased by the many runnels of fine spring water which poured down the fissures of the mountain into the plain we had left.

By the sides of these runnels, we frequently paused, and making a cup of a large leaf, filled it with the cool, limpid water that gurgled over the rocks, to quench our constant thirst; and for a time such vegetable cups were the only drinking vessels we had while on the island of Alphonso.

At last we gained the summit of the mountain, and with mingled satisfaction and anxiety in our hearts, swept the horizon with eager eyes.

Not a sail was in sight!

Far as our eyesight could reach around us, in a mighty circle, rolled the waters of the Southern Atlantic, almost tepid with heat, and pale and white, as they seemed to palpitate under the rays of the unclouded sun.

At our feet lay the whole isle of Alphonso and its two rocky appendages, with the encircling sea boiling in the narrow chasms between them, with a fury which was the result of contrary currents, and which formed a singular contrast to its calmness elsewhere.

After a brief rest we prepared to set up the signal-post.

Tom took off his shirt, and drawing from his pocket a piece of spunyarn, which a seaman is seldom without, he lashed his under-garment to the end of the studding-sail boom, and by the aid of the hatchet and our hands, we scraped a hole sufficiently deep in which to erect the spar, and then jammed it hard and fast with stones. As the shirt was blown out flag fashion upon the wind, we hoped it would prove a sufficient indication to a vessel approaching from any quarter that there were people on the island in want of succor.

For some hours we lingered on the mountain-top, in the fond hope of seeing a sail, and then returned slowly downward to the beach, where our shipmates awaited us at the wigwam which now formed our home, and which we jocularly designated the capital city of Alphonso.