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Nevertheless, in this trim, and with these companions, I passed out of the fishing-pool into the sea, with the intention of rowing round the island. Mrs Reichardt waved her hand as I departed on my voyage, having exhorted me to be very careful, as long as I was in hearing; she then turned away, as I thought, to return to the hut. The day was remarkably fine.
Mrs Reichardt would not be left behind; it was possible she might be useful, and taking with her a small basket of such things as she imagined might be required, she accompanied me to the rocks nearest the sea. On arriving there, the most extraordinary scene presented itself.
I was still in a half-dozing state, when the breathing and cold nose of Nero touched my cheek, and the murmurings of my favourite roused me up, and I opened my eyes. "I am better now," said I, to Mrs Reichardt. "How kind you have been." "Yes, you are better; but still, you must remain quiet. Do you think that you could walk to your bed-place?"
They were not so loud, and did not reverberate so much; they seemed to come nearer, and then the difference in sound became very perceptible. "Great God!" exclaimed Mrs Reichardt, starting up from her kneeling posture, "that is a gun from some ship." The wind seemed less boisterous for a few seconds, and the thunder ceased.
I looked in vain for land; I looked equally in vain for a ship; there was nothing visible but this shoal of whales, and Mrs Reichardt endeavoured to cheer me by describing the importance of the whale-fishery to England, and the perils which the men meet with who pursue the fish for the purpose of wounding them with an iron instrument called a harpoon.
The Doctor had resolved to send young Reichardt to a distant place, where many learned men lived together in colleges, for the purpose of further advancing his education, and fitting him for a religious teacher, to which vocation he had long expressed a desire to devote himself.
"I suppose," I here observed, "that the people who lived there, were deeply impressed with their good fortune in finding such an asylum?" "As far as I could ever ascertain," Mrs Reichardt replied, "it was exactly the reverse. It was always thought so degrading to enter a workhouse, that the industrious labourer would endure any and every privation rather than live there.
Mrs Reichardt would not disturb me. In sleep I was insensible to the miseries and dangers of my position. She could not bring herself to disturb a repose that was at once so necessary to mind and body; and I fell into a sweet dream of a new home in that dear England I had prayed so often to see; and bright faces smiled upon me, and voices welcomed me, full of tenderness and affection.
The reader, then, may judge of my surprise when, one sultry day, I had been busily engaged for several hours cutting down a field of wheat, Mrs Reichardt came running to me with the astounding news that there was a ship off the island, and a boat full of people had just left her, and were rowing towards the rocks.
Our hut we had metamorphosed into something Mrs Reichardt styled a rustic cottage, which, covered as it was with flowers and creepers, really looked very pretty; and the garden added greatly to its pleasant appearance: for near the house we had transplanted everything that bore a flower that could be found in the island, and had planted some shrubs, that, having been carefully nurtured made rapid growth, and screened the hut from the wind.
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