w I
wished that I could go off and warn them.

We had scarcely thought about the captain and the rest of the men on
shore. If they had escaped, we need not have much apprehension about
ourselves; but if they had been put to death, we, I still dreaded, on
reaching the shore might meet with the same fate.

"What can we do, Dick, to let Miss Kitty and the mate know their
danger?" I asked. "If they come up the harbour, there will be no
chance for them."

"We can do nothing, Charley," he answered. "They are in God's hands, as
we are, and we must trust to Him to take care of us all."

The young chief now made another sign to Dick and me to get into the
canoe, so we lowered ourselves down, and went up to where the chief was
standing. His canoe, like many others around, was of considerable
length, fully forty feet, though not more than a foot and a half wide,
and of about the same depth. She was kept from upsetting by outriggers
projecting from the bow, middle, and stern, with a long piece of light
wood secured to the extremity of each. On the upper part of the stem,
which projected about two feet, was a carved head of some animal; while
the after part also projected six feet or more beyond the actual stern,
something like the shape of a Dutch skate. The paddles were neatly made
of a hard black wood, highly polished, with slender handles, and the
blades of an oval form. I afterwards examined the canoe, and found that
it was composed of many pieces of the bread-fruit tree, cut into planks
and sewed together with the fibres of the outside shell of the
cocoa-nut. The seams were covered inside and out with strips of bamboo
sewed to the edge of each plank, to keep in a stuffing of cocoa-nut
fibre. The keel consisted of one piece, which ran the whole length, and
was hollowed out in the form of a canoe, being, indeed, the foundation
of the vessel. Three pieces of thick plank, placed as partitions,
divided the interior into four parts, and served for timbers to keep her
from separating or closing together. She had also a mat sail, broad at
the top, and narrowing to a point at the foot.

The chief told as to sit down, and directed his crew to paddle towards
the shore. This they did, accompanied by several other canoes, which
were apparently under his command.

We frequently turned our eyes towards the boat, but the wind was scant
and light, and she made but little progress up the harbour. Probably
Miss Kitty and th