thin the hulk. Yet it was
little that we could even suggest; for though one spoke of how he had
seen a rope cast by means of a mortar to a ship that lay off shore, yet
this helped us not, for we had no mortar; but here the same man cried out
that they in the ship might have such a thing, so that they would be able
to shoot the rope to us, and at this we thought more upon his saying; for
if they had such a weapon, then might our difficulties be solved. Yet we
were greatly at a loss to know how we should discover whether they were
possessed of one, and further to explain our design to them. But here the
bo'sun came to our help, and bade one man go quickly and char some of the
reeds in the fire, and whilst this was doing he spread out upon the rock
one of the spare lengths of canvas; then he sung out to the man to bring
him one of the pieces of charred reed, and with this he wrote our
question upon the canvas, calling for fresh charcoal as he required it.
Then, having made an end of writing, he bade two of the men take hold of
the canvas by the ends and expose it to the view of those in the ship,
and in this manner we got them to understand our desires. For, presently,
some of them went away, and came back after a little, and held up for us
to see, a very great square of white, and upon it a great "NO," and at
this were we again at our wits' ends to know how it would be possible to
rescue those within the ship; for, suddenly, our whole desire to leave
the island, was changed into a determination to rescue the people in the
hulk, and, indeed, had our intentions not been such we had been veritable
curs; though I am happy to tell that we had no thought at this juncture
but for those who were now looking to us to restore them once more to the
world to which they had been so long strangers.

Now, as I have said, we were again at our wits' ends to know how to come
at those within the hulk, and there we stood all of us, talking together,
perchance we should hit upon some plan, and anon we would turn and wave
to those who watched us so anxiously. Yet, a while passed, and we had
come no nearer to a method of rescue. Then a thought came to me (waked
perchance by the mention of shooting the rope over to the hulk by means
of a mortar) how that I had read once in a book, of a fair maid whose
lover effected her escape from a castle by a similar artifice, only that
in his case he made use of a bow in place of a mortar, and a cord instead