successive crashes from every rocky promontory along the coast, and
died away to a faint mutter far out at sea.

In the course of an hour the governor made his appearance, and as it
was beginning to grow dark, we all climbed once more to the summit of
the bluff to take a last look at the ship before she should be hidden
from sight. There was no appearance of activity on board, and the
lateness of the hour made it improbable that Arnold and Robinson would
return before morning. We went back therefore to the empty government
house, or "kazarm," and spent half the night in fruitless conjectures
as to the cause of the vessel's late arrival and the nature of the
news which she would bring.

With the earliest morning twilight, Dodd and I clambered again to the
crest of the bluff, to assure ourselves by actual observation that
the ship had not vanished like the _Flying Dutchman_ under cover of
darkness, and left us to mourn another disappointment. There was
little ground for fear. Not only was the bark still in the position
which she had previously occupied, but there had been another arrival
during the night. A large three-masted steamer, of apparently 2000
tons, was lying in the offing, and three small boats could be seen a
few miles distant pulling swiftly toward the mouth of the river.
Great was the excitement which this discovery produced. Dodd rushed
furiously down the hill to the _kazarm_, shouting to the Major that
there was a steamer in the gulf, and that boats were within five miles
of the lighthouse. In a few moments we were all gathered in a group on
the highest point of the bluff, speculating upon the character of the
mysterious steamer which had thus taken us by surprise, and watching
the approach of the boats. The largest of these was now within three
miles, and our glasses enabled us to distinguish in the long, regular
sweep of its oars, the practised stroke of a man-of-war's crew, and in
its stem-sheets the peculiar shoulder-straps of Russian officers. The
steamer was evidently a large war-ship, but what had, brought her to
that remote, unfrequented part of the world we could not conjecture.

In half an hour more, two of the boats were abreast of lighthouse
bluff, and we descended to the landing-place to meet them in a state
of excitement not easily imagined. Fourteen months had elapsed since
we had heard from home, and the prospect of receiving letters and
of getting once more to work was a sufficient excu