is rather large for her!" observed the reporter.

"Well! Mr. Spilett," replied the sailor, "I agree that it is too large
for the _Bonadventure_; but if the fleets of the Union were in want of
a harbour in the Pacific, I don't think they would ever find a better
place than this!"

"We are in the shark's mouth," remarked Neb, alluding to the form of
the gulf.

"Right into its mouth, my honest Neb!" replied Herbert; "but you are
not afraid that it will shut upon us, are you?"

"No, Mr. Herbert," answered Neb; "and yet this gulf here doesn't
please me much! It has a wicked look!"

"Hallo!" cried Pencroft, "here is Neb turning up his nose at my gulf,
just as I was thinking of presenting it to America!"

"But, at any rate, is the water deep enough?" asked the engineer, "for
a depth sufficient for the keel of the _Bonadventure_, would not be
enough for those of our iron-clads."

"That is easily found out," replied Pencroft.

And the sailor sounded with a long cord, which served him as a
lead-line, and to which was fastened a lump of iron. This cord
measured nearly fifty fathoms, and its entire length was unrolled
without finding any bottom.

"There," exclaimed Pencroft, "our iron-clads can come here after all!
They would not run aground!"

"Indeed," said Gideon Spilett, "this gulf is a regular abyss; but,
taking into consideration the volcanic origin of the island, it is not
astonishing that the sea should offer similar depressions."

"One would say too," observed Herbert, "that these cliffs were
perfectly perpendicular; and I believe that at their foot, even with a
line five or six times longer, Pencroft would not find the bottom."

"That is all very well," then said the reporter; "but I must point out
to Pencroft that his harbour is wanting in one very important
respect!"

"And what is that, Mr. Spilett?"

"An opening, a cutting of some sort, to give access to the interior of
the island. I do not see a spot on which we could land."

And, in fact, the steep lava cliffs did not afford a single place
suitable for landing. They formed an insuperable barrier, recalling,
but with more wildness, the fiords of Norway. The _Bonadventure_,
coasting as close as possible along the cliffs, did not discover even
a projection which would allow the passengers to leave the deck.

Pencroft consoled himself by saying that with the help of a mine they
could soon open out the cliff when that was necessary, and then, as
there