Towards the southward, however, Mark found the objects of his greatest wonder and admiration.  By the time he reached the apex of the rock, the smoke in that quarter of the horizon had, in a great measure, risen from the sea; though a column of it continued to ascend towards a vast, dun-coloured cloud that overhung the place.  To Mark’s astonishment he had seen some dark, dense body first looming through the rising vapour.  When the last was sufficiently removed, a high, ragged mountain became distinctly visible.  He thought it arose at least a thousand feet above the ocean, and that it could not be less than a league in extent.  This exhibition of the power of nature filled the young man’s soul with adoration and reverence for the mighty Being that could set such elements at work.  It did not alarm him, but rather tended to quiet his longings to quit the place; for he who lives amid such scenes feels that he is so much nearer to the arm of God than those who dwell in uniform security, as to think less of ordinary advantages than is common.

Mark knew that there must have been a dislocation of the rocks, to produce such a change as that he saw to the southward.  It was well for him it occurred there at a distance, as he then thought, of ten or fifteen miles from the Reef, though in truth it was at quite fifty, instead of happening beneath him.  It was possible, however, for one to have been on the top of that mountain, and to have lived through the late change, could the lungs of man have breathed the atmosphere.  Not far from this mountain a column of smoke rose out of the sea, and Mark fancied that, at moments, he could discern the summit of an active crater at its base.

After gazing at these astonishing changes for a long time, our young man descended from the height and retraced his steps homeward.  Kitty gladly preceded him, and some time after the sun had set, they regained the Reef.  About a mile short of home, Mark passed all the hogs, snugly deposited in a bed of mud, where they had esconced themselves for the night, as one draws himself beneath his blanket.

Chapter XII.

    “All things in common nature should produce
    Without sweat or endeavour:  treason, felony,
    Sword, pike, gun, or need of any engine
    Would I not have; but nature should bring forth
    Of its own kind, all foizen, all abundance
    To feed my innocent people.”

    Tempest.

For the next ten days Mark Woolston did little but explore.  By crossing the channel around the Reef, which he had named the ‘Armlet’ (the young man often talked to himself), he reached the sea-wall, and, once there, he made a long excursion to the eastward.  He now walked dryshod over those very reefs among which he had so recently sailed in the Bridget, though the ship-channel through which he and Bob had brought in the Rancocus still remained.  The two buoys that had marked the narrow passage were found, high and dry; and the anchor of the ship, that by which she rode after beating over the rocks into deep water, was to be seen so near the surface, that the stock could be reached by the hand.