it till we know our men. Lay-to, and whistle for a
wind, that's my view."

"Jim here," said the doctor, "can help us more than any one. The men are
not shy with him, and Jim is a noticing lad."

"Hawkins, I put prodigious faith in you," added the squire.

I began to feel pretty desperate at this, for I felt altogether helpless;
and yet, by an odd train of circumstances, it was indeed through me that
safety came. In the meantime, talk as we pleased, there were only seven
out of the twenty-six on whom we knew we could rely; and out of these
seven one was a boy, so that the grown men on our side were six to their
nineteen.

PART III

MY SHORE ADVENTURE

CHAPTER XIII

HOW I BEGAN MY SHORE ADVENTURE

The appearance of the island when I came on deck next morning was
altogether changed. Although the breeze had now utterly failed, we had
made a great deal of way during the night, and were now lying becalmed
about half a mile to the south-east of the low eastern coast.
Grey-coloured woods covered a large part of the surface. This even tint
was indeed broken up by streaks of yellow sandbreak in the lower lands,
and by many tall trees of the pine family, out-topping the others--some
singly, some in clumps; but the general colouring was uniform and sad.
The hills ran up clear above the vegetation in spires of naked rock. All
were strangely shaped, and the Spy-glass, which was by three or four
hundred feet the tallest on the island, was likewise the strangest in
configuration, running up sheer from almost every side, and then suddenly
cut off at the top like a pedestal to put a statue on.

The _Hispaniola_ was rolling scuppers under in the ocean swell. The booms
were tearing at the blocks, the rudder was banging to and fro, and the
whole ship creaking, groaning, and jumping like a manufactory. I had to
cling tight to the backstay, and the world turned giddily before my eyes;
for though I was a good enough sailor when there was way on, this
standing still and being rolled about like a bottle was a thing I never
learned to stand without a qualm or so, above all in the morning, on an
empty stomach.

Perhaps it was this--perhaps it was the look of the island, with its
grey, melancholy woods, and wild stone spires, and the surf that we could
both see and hear foaming and thundering on the steep beach--at least,
although the sun shone bright and hot, and the shore-birds were fishing
and crying all around