ngs, and
didn't make a very good beginning at it.

The next day, we set out to explore Anastasia Island, right opposite the
town. It is a big island, but we took our lunch and determined to do
what we could. We hired a boat and rowed over to the mouth of a creek in
the island. We went up this creek quite a long way, and landed at a
little pier, where we made the boat fast. The man who owned the boat
told us just how to go. We first made a flying call at the coquina
quarries, where they dig the curious stuff of which the town is built.
This is formed of small shells, all conglomerated into one solid mass
that becomes as hard as stone after it is exposed to the air. It must
have taken thousands of years for so many little shell-fish to pile
themselves up into a quarrying-ground. We now went over to the
light-house, and climbed to the top of it, where we had a view that made
Rectus feel even better than he felt in the cemetery at Savannah.

When we came down, we started for the beach and stopped a little while
at the old Spanish light-house, which looked more like a cracker-bakery
than anything else, but I suppose it was good enough for all the ships
the Spaniards had to light up. We would have cared more for the old
light-house if it had not had an inscription on it that said it had been
destroyed, and rebuilt by some American. After that, we considered it
merely in the light of a chromo.

We had a good time on the island, and stayed nearly all day. Toward the
end of the afternoon, we started back for the creek and our boat. We had
a long walk, for we had been exploring the island pretty well, and when,
at last, we reached the creek, we saw that our boat was gone!

This was astounding. We could not make out how the thing could have
happened. The boatman, from whom we had hired it, had said that it would
be perfectly safe for us to leave the boat at the landing if we tied her
up well and hid the oars. I had tied her up very well and we had hidden
the oars so carefully, under some bushes, that we found them there when
we went to look for them.

"Could the old thing have floated off of itself?" said Rectus.

"That couldn't have happened," I said. "I tied her hard and fast."

"But how could any one have taken her away without oars?" asked Rectus.

"Rectus," said I, "don't let us have any more riddles. Some one may have
cut a pole and poled her away, up or down the creek, or----"

"I'll tell you," interrupted Rectus.