The House Under the Sea: A Romance

IN WHICH JASPER BEGG MAKES KNOWN THE PURPOSE OF HIS VOYAGE TO THE PACIFIC OCEAN, AND HOW IT CAME ABOUT THAT HE COMMISSIONED THE STEAM-SHIP SOUTHERN CROSS THROUGH PHILIPS, WESTBU...

We put off from the ship at six bells in the morning watch. Dolly Venn, who was rated as fourth officer, was with me in the launch, and Harry Doe, the boatswain, at the tiller....

Now, she was sitting in the garden, in a kind of arbour built of leaves, and near by her was her relative, the rats'-tailed old lady we used to call Aunt Rachel. The pair didn't...

"Lads," I said, for it was not a day when a man picked his talk; "lads," said I, "this ship goes full steam ahead for 'Frisco, and you'll be wanting to know the reason why. Well...

Now, when Seth Barker cried out that a ship was ashore on the dangerous reefs to the northward of the main island, it is not necessary to tell you what we, a crew of British sea...

I had made up my mind to take every proper precaution before going up to the house where my mistress lived; and with caution in my head I left Seth Barker, the carpenter, up on...

Now, no sooner did I see the yellow man than my mind was fully made up, and I determined what harbour to make for. "If you're there, my lad," said I to myself, "the others are n...

There had been a great sound of "halloaing" and firing in the woods when we raced through them for our lives; but it was all still and cold on the mountain-side, and you could h...

The wind blew a hurricane all that night, and was still a full gale when dawn broke. To say that no man among us slept is to put down a very obvious thing. The roaring of the br...

We ran up the hill, I say, as men who raced for their lives. The little girls, snatching up their bags and baskets, exchanged a quick word with Clair-de-Lune and then hurried of...

The day fell powerfully hot, with scarce a breath of wind and a Pacific sun beating fiercely on the barren rocks. What shelter was to be had we got in the low cave behind the pl...

It was a great surprise to me that here should have been one of Edmond Czerny's men left in the bungalow; and when I heard his voice I stood for a full minute, uncertain whether...

You have been informed that Dr. Gray promised us three days' security in the bungalow, and I will now tell you how it came about that we quitted the house next morning, and set...

We must have been a third of a mile from the shore when the doctor spoke, and three hundred yards, perhaps, from the pool in the glens. It is true that the storm seemed to clear...

* The editor has thought it well to give at this point the above extract from Ruth Bellenden's diary, as permitting some insight into the events which transpired on Ken's Island...

We had no notion that the doctor had come by any serious hurt, and when he fell in a dead faint we stood as men struck by an unseen hand. Light we still had, for the rolling lan...

I drew back into a patch of shadow and waited for her to come up to me. Others might be with her and the moment inopportune for our encounter. She walked with slow steps. Care h...

The devils were out; never once did I doubt it. The alarm bell ringing loudly in the corridor, the tramp of feet as of an army marching, the cry of man to man proclaimed the fac...

I was the first to be out on the rock, but Peter Bligh was close upon my heels, and, wonderful to tell, the Italian almost as quick as any of us. To what gate of the sea the sta...

We carried the shot to the stairs' head, each man working as though his own life were the price of willing labour. If Miss Ruth had tidings of the great good fortune the night h...

It was just after dawn that Miss Ruth came up from her room below and found me at my lonely post on the plateau of the watch-tower rock. Dolly Venn was fast asleep by that time,...

It was near about midday on a Saturday that we saved the poor folks from the island, and not long after midnight on the Monday that our troubles came to a head. I like to call t...

We have not returned to the watch-tower rock, nor can we bring ourselves to that while there is any hope left to us of helping those whom Czerny marooned on the dangerous shore....

The shot was fired and answered at the lower gate. We had looked for that; for that we had been waiting during the watching hours. They would attack the lesser reef, we said, an...

I have told you the story of Ken's Island, but there are some things you will need to know, and of these I will now make mention. Let me speak of them in order as they befell.