n it; but it was the more proof that
some of our kind were no more than the half of a mile from our camp.

And at last the day came.

XI

The Signals from the Ship

Now so soon as it was clearly light, we went all of us to the leeward
brow of the hill to stare upon the derelict, which now we had cause to
believe no derelict, but an inhabited vessel. Yet though we watched her
for upwards of two hours, we could discover no sign of any living
creature, the which, indeed, had we been in cooler minds, we had not
thought strange, seeing that she was all so shut in by the great
superstructure; but we were hot to see a fellow creature, after so much
lonesomeness and terror in strange lands and seas, and so could not by
any means contain ourselves in patience until those aboard the hulk
should choose to discover themselves to us.

And so, at last, being wearied with watching, we made it up together to
shout when the bo'sun should give us the signal, by this means making a
good volume of sound which we conceived the wind might carry down to the
vessel. Yet though we raised many shouts, making as it seemed to us a
very great noise, there came no response from the ship, and at last we
were fain to cease from our calling, and ponder some other way of
bringing ourselves to the notice of those within the hulk.

For a while we talked, some proposing one thing, and some another; but
none of them seeming like to achieve our purpose. And after that we fell
to marveling that the fire which we had lit in the valley had not
awakened them to the fact that some of their fellow creatures were upon
the island; for, had it, we could not suppose but that they would have
kept a perpetual watch upon the island until such time as they should
have been able to attract our notice. Nay! more than this, it was scarce
credible that they should not have made an answering fire, or set some of
their bunting above the superstructure, so that our gaze should be
arrested upon the instant we chanced to glance towards the hulk. But so
far from this, there appeared even a purpose to shun our attention; for
that light which we had viewed in the past night was more in the way of
an accident, than of the nature of a purposeful exhibition.

And so, presently, we went to breakfast, eating heartily; our night of
wakefulness having given us mighty appetites; but, for all that, we were
so engrossed by the mystery of the lonesome craft, that I doubt if any o