e foot of the cliff,
which appeared to maintain a tolerably uniform height of about three
hundred and fifty feet.

From the point where he now stood the ground sloped pretty evenly down
to the water, the inclination of the slope being about one foot in every
three; and the distance to the water's-edge a mile, as near as might be.
The base of this long slope terminated in a narrow strip of sandy
beach, which was strewed here and there with timber and what-not from
the wreck in the offing. This wreck Mr Gaunt was exceedingly anxious
to visit, as he felt it might--and probably would--prove of inestimable
value to himself and his companions. She was not more than half a mile
distant from the beach, and was lying close to the inside fringe of the
white water which broke over the outlying reef. Her bows pointed
shoreward, but at an angle which enabled the engineer to catch a glimpse
of her entire broadside; and she was lying well over on her side, with
her inclined deck towards the island, thus enabling Gaunt to get, with
the aid of his telescope, a fairly good view of her, and to form a
tolerably accurate estimate of the amount of damage which she had
received. She was a large vessel, measuring, as near as he could judge,
some sixteen hundred tons, and she appeared to be built of wood. She
had been either barque or ship-rigged; but all three of her masts were
over the side, and could be seen floating there still attached to the
hull by the rigging. Her bulwarks were entirely swept away, as also
were her deck-houses--the broken stanchions of which Gaunt thought he
could detect still projecting above the surface of the deck. The stem
and stern-posts of a couple of boats still dangled from her davits;
which seemed to point to the conclusion that when disaster overtook her
the crew had been allowed little or no time in which to provide for
their safety.

Gaunt was an excellent swimmer, and, having no boat, he thought his
quickest mode of reaching the vessel would be by taking to the water.
He was on the point of stripping for this purpose when, his eye still
fixed upon the ship, he caught a glimpse of two or three small dark
objects projecting above the surface of the water and moving slowly
about. He had a very shrewd suspicion as to the nature of these
objects, and his telescope soon demonstrated to him the fact that he was
right in believing them to be the dorsal fins of so many sharks.

He was scarcely prepared fo