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Dec. 21st.-A heavy swell from the south-west rolling us about most uncomfortably. A steady wind was blowing however, and we got on very well. Dec. 22d.-The swell had gone down. We passed Boutong, a large island, high, woody, and populous, the native place of some of our crew. A small prau returning from Bali to the island of Goram overtook us.
"I promise," said Lingard, "to see you some day." The calm surface of the bay reflected the glorious night sky, and the brig with the prau riding astern seemed to be suspended amongst the stars in a peace that was almost unearthly in the perfection of its unstirring silence. The last hand-shakes were exchanged on deck, and the Malays went aboard their own craft.
"Blown out!" said the major laconically as if he were speaking of a candle; but the words had hardly left his lips before with a frightful explosion the mountain blazed forth again, with the glare far more intense, and showing the prau they had dimly-seen before coming on fast. "The eruption does not seem to scare them," said the captain. "Well, it does me," said the major.
"The sea met us the sea, wide, pathless, and without voice. A sailing prau leaves no track. We went south. The moon was full; and, looking up, we said to one another, 'When the next moon shines as this one, we shall return and they will be dead. It was fifteen years ago. Many moons have grown full and withered and I have not seen my land since.
Mark watched the departing prau with no little eagerness as he recalled accounts which he had read of attacks by pirates, poisoned krises, and goodly vessels plundered by the bloodthirsty men of Moslem creed, who looked upon the slaying of a Christian as a meritorious act.
She had ravished his heart! From my stockade I saw him put out to sea in a big boat. Matara and I watched him from the fighting platform behind the pointed stakes. He sat cross-legged, with his gun in his hands, on the roof at the stern of his prau. The barrel of his rifle glinted aslant before his big red face.
He went in the small prau I had fitted up at Goram, and through the kind assistance of the Dutch Resident at Ternate, a lieutenant and two soldiers were sent by the Sultan of Tidore to accompany and protect him, and to assist him in getting men and in visiting the interior. Notwithstanding these precautions, Mr.
"The water retires like this, only to come back in force. There: it is coming back." They needed no telling, for the awful roar of the earthquake wave announced its coming, and with it as they remained fixed and helpless upon the rock they could see the prau, after being sucked out, as it were, for nearly a quarter of a mile, being carried back at terrific speed.
It is as costly as a wife and children." The guests rose and took their leave. "You fired three shots for me, Panglima Hassim," said Lingard, seriously, "and I have had three barrels of powder put on board your prau; one for each shot. But we are not quits." The Malay's eyes glittered with pleasure. "This is indeed a friend's gift. Come to see me in my country!"
I myself had hoped rather than expected ever to reach this "Ultima Thule" of the East: and when I found that I really could do so now, had I but courage to trust myself for a thousand miles' voyage in a Bugis prau, and for six or seven months among lawless traders and ferocious savages, I felt somewhat as I did when, a schoolboy, I was for the first time allowed to travel outside the stage-coach, to visit that scene of all that is strange and new and wonderful to young imaginations-London!
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