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- 7340
- extracted_at
- 2026-01-30T07:57:55.413Z
- extracted_by
- structure-extraction-lambda
- start_line
- 7271
- text
- remain untold. Those two unnamed events which befell Hunilla on this
isle, let them abide between her and her God. In nature, as in law, it
may be libelous to speak some truths.
Still, how it was that, although our vessel had lain three days
anchored nigh the isle, its one human tenant should not have discovered
us till just upon the point of sailing, never to revisit so lone and
far a spot, this needs explaining ere the sequel come.
The place where the French captain had landed the little party was on
the further and opposite end of the isle. There, too, it was that they
had afterwards built their hut. Nor did the widow in her solitude
desert the spot where her loved ones had dwelt with her, and where the
dearest of the twain now slept his last long sleep, and all her plaints
awaked him not, and he of husbands the most faithful during life.
Now, high, broken land rises between the opposite extremities of the
isle. A ship anchored at one side is invisible from the other. Neither
is the isle so small, but a considerable company might wander for days
through the wilderness of one side, and never be seen, or their halloos
heard, by any stranger holding aloof on the other. Hence Hunilla, who
naturally associated the possible coming of ships with her own part of
the isle, might to the end have remained quite ignorant of the presence
of our vessel, were it not for a mysterious presentiment, borne to her,
so our mariners averred, by this isle’s enchanted air. Nor did the
widow’s answer undo the thought.
“How did you come to cross the isle this morning, then, Hunilla?” said
our Captain.
“Señor, something came flitting by me. It touched my cheek, my heart,
Señor.”
“What do you say, Hunilla?”
“I have said, Señor, something came through the air.”
It was a narrow chance. For when in crossing the isle Hunilla gained
the high land in the centre, she must then for the first have perceived
our masts, and also marked that their sails were being loosed, perhaps
even heard the echoing chorus of the windlass song. The strange ship
was about to sail, and she behind. With all haste she now descends the
height on the hither side, but soon loses sight of the ship among the
sunken jungles at the mountain’s base. She struggles on through the
withered branches, which seek at every step to bar her path, till she
comes to the isolated rock, still some way from the water. This she
climbs, to reassure herself. The ship is still in plainest sight. But
now, worn out with over tension, Hunilla all but faints; she fears to
step down from her giddy perch; she is fain to pause, there where she
is, and as a last resort catches the turban from her head, unfurls and
waves it over the jungles towards us.
During the telling of her story the mariners formed a voiceless circle
round Hunilla and the Captain; and when at length the word was given to
man the fastest boat, and pull round to the isle’s thither side, to
bring away Hunilla’s chest and the tortoise-oil, such alacrity of both
cheery and sad obedience seldom before was seen. Little ado was made.
Already the anchor had been recommitted to the bottom, and the ship
swung calmly to it.
But Hunilla insisted upon accompanying the boat as indispensable pilot
to her hidden hut. So being refreshed with the best the steward could
supply, she started with us. Nor did ever any wife of the most famous
admiral, in her husband’s barge, receive more silent reverence of
respect than poor Hunilla from this boat’s crew.
Rounding many a vitreous cape and bluff, in two hours’ time we shot
inside the fatal reef; wound into a secret cove, looked up along a
green many-gabled lava wall, and saw the island’s solitary dwelling.
- title
- Chunk 6