fifth.

'Still keeping the same direction, by this time I had arrived at the
very edge of the world, beyond which there is nothing but sea and sky.
Believing that the poor creature had flown out over this lonely sea, and
hoping that it might return when it realised that there was no land
beyond, I determined to wait on the desolate shore.

'I now erected my pole on the sands, after once more baiting my hook,
this time with a piece of my last kernel, having taken the precaution of
cutting it into six pieces. I now waited patiently, week after week,
subsisting on the oysters, the starfish, and the edible crustaceans,
that wandered tamely about the shore. Months now passed by, and, one by
one, the five pieces of my last yap kernel had followed the other five
kernels with which I had set out from home. I am not easily beaten,
however, and though many months had passed by without my meeting with
any success, I would not give in, but husbanded my last piece of bait
with the greatest care. I cut a chip of wood from my angling pole, and
shaped it in the form of a kernel of the Peruvian yap bean. This I
rubbed well all over with the tiny piece of the real kernel that yet
remained to me, until it assumed somewhat the colour of the original
bean and, certainly, when applied to the tip of the tongue, it appeared
to partake, though very slightly, it is true, of the original flavour,
and with this I once more baited my hook.

[Illustration: ITS OLD STATELY SELF AGAIN]

'By this means I made my last piece of bean last for some years, for as
soon as the artificial bean had lost its flavour, I rubbed it up again
with the real one. But even this could not go on for ever, and, at last,
the true piece was worn right away; so, to preserve what little flavour
there yet remained of the true bean in the false bean, on which it had
been so often rubbed, I soaked it for six days in a large shell of
rain-water. In the meantime I cut another chip from my pole, and spent
nearly six days in carving out another artificial kernel. Before
baiting my hook with this, I dipped it into the fluid in which the old
wooden kernel was still soaking, whence it received a very very faint
suggestion of the original flavour, but so faint was this that it had to
be redipped three times a day. This went on for some time, until the
precious liquor began to run low, and I was compelled to dilute it still
further, in the proportion of about five drops to a mussel-sh