Blackwell's Island

“ It is a deep-rooted instinct in human nature to walk out to the end of a dock and sit down and gaze; and hundreds of them do so every day in summer, up along here. Now and then, through these vistas you get a good view of beautiful Blackwell's Island and its prison and hospital and poorhouse buildings. Those who see it oftenest do not consider it beautiful. They always speak of it as "The Island." ”

“ Vacant eyes and meaningless faces, and their tongues uttered meaningless nonsense. One crowd passed and I 69noted, by nose as well as eyes, that they were fearfully dirty.
“Who are they?” I asked of a patient near me.
“They are considered the most violent on the island,” she replied. “They are from the Lodge, the first building with the high steps.” Some were yelling, some were cursing, others were singing or praying or preaching, as the fancy struck them, and they made up the most miserable collection of humanity I had ever seen. ”

“ The horizon lay round as clear as heart could wish—not a speck in sight save the little dingy islets at a distance; the broad blue ocean sparkling far away on one side, and the water to windward, in the direction we had come, showing the same brownish tint we had seen the day before, while it took the island before us in its bight, and turned off eastward with the breeze till it spread against the open sky. The top of the land was high enough to shut out the sea-line, and, being low water at the time, it was plain enough now why Jones wished to keep the white streaks over-night ”

“ Larger and larger it loomed as we stood before the breeze, till there was no doubt we had the bulk of a small low island not far to windward of us, a couple of points or thereabouts on our larboard bow when she fell off a little—lying with the ragged outline of it rising to a top near one end, its shape stretched black and distinct in the midst of the pale sea ”

“ Looking far away northward and eastward across the water, dotted with white sails coming in with the tide, the island rocks light up brilliantly in the setting sun. The air is so clear seaward that we can distinguish little houses on the island which guards the port, and on more distant rocks far out to sea, all glittering in the sun. Turning southward, to the real bay of Paimpol, which we cannot see from the town, the opposite banks are in shadow, and the foliage which reaches to the water’s edge takes a rich purple tinge. ”

“ How lonely the island seemed when I landed again! The sun was down, and twilight is unknown in these northern regions. The darkness comes up at once. The canoe safely pulled up and turned over on her face, I groped my way up the little narrow pathway to the verandah. The six lamps were soon burning merrily in the front room; but in the kitchen, where I "dined," the shadows were so gloomy, and the lamplight was so inadequate, that the stars could be seen peeping through the cracks between the rafters. ”

“ One of these islands, the abode of innumerable wild-fowl, is said, with doubtful authority, to be the Island of Avalon, or Avilion, where King Arthur was buried.
All round these rocky promontories the inhabitants live more on the sea than on the land; they look to the sea for their harvest, and glean on the shore rather than in the fields. The children of this seafaring community, when tired of the earth, take to the water naturally, and it is not an uncommon thing to see the mother of a family rush from her cottage, lift up her skirts deftly, and jump into the sea to the rescue. ”

“ There could be no longer any doubt that for some purpose of their own the men had been going round and round the island for some time, waiting for an opportunity to land. I strained my eyes to follow them in the darkness, but the night had completely swallowed them up, and not even the faintest swish of the paddles reached my ears as the Indians plied their long and powerful strokes. The canoe would be round again in a few moments, and this time it was possible that the men might land. ”

“ The group lies between the south end of New Ireland and the north end of the great Bougainville Island in the Solomon Archipelago, and consists of six low, well-wooded and fertile islands, enclosed within a barrier reef, forming a noble atoll, almost circular in shape. All the islands are thickly populated at the present day by natives, who are peaceable enough, and engage in bêche-de-mer and pearl-shell fishing. ”

“ Firearms, shovels, and axes were then placed in the boat. Four rowers took their positions; and Captains Kidd and Redfield climbed down the rope ladder, and sat in the stern. Everything was ready, and word was given to ply the oars.
Soon the ship became a mystic shape in the dim distance; and, as the inlet was entered, it was lost entirely to view. By tortuous passages among the marshes, they drew up at the island—Money Island.
"Island the fourth!" said Captain Kidd jocularly. "Magnificent indeed will be the buccaneer's castle in Merry England when they all give up their wealth! ”

“ About the time I was a boy in a merchantman's forecastle, 'twas a sort of floating yarn amongst some seamen, this White-water Island, I remembered; but I never met with a man that had seen it, every one having had it from a shipmate last voyage, though a terrible place it had been, by all accounts, without one's knowing exactly where it was. One craft of some kind had gone to find out a treasure that was buried in it, and she never was heard of more; a man took a fancy to live ashore in it, like Robinson Crusoe, and he went mad ”

“ On Boone Island, where the Nottingham galley went down one hundred and fifty years ago, the survivors turned cannibals to escape starvation, while Haley's Island is peopled by shipwrecked Spanish ghosts that hail vessels and beg for passage back to their country. The pirate Teach, or Blackbeard, used to put in at these islands to hide his treasure, and one of his lieutenants spent some time on White Island with a beautiful girl whom he had abducted from her home in Scotland and who, in spite of his rough life, had learned to love him. ”

“ I very seldom get such a chance as this.”
“There is no resisting that!” replied the graceful Carne; “I have not the honour of knowing a lady in England, except my aunt Mrs. Twemlow, and my cousin Eliza—both very good, but to the last degree insular.”
“It is very hard to help being that, when people have never been out of an island. ”

“ The sun was high in the heavens when my companion woke me from a heavy sleep and announced that the porridge was cooked and there was just time to bathe. The grateful smell of frizzling bacon entered the tent door.
"River still rising," he said, "and several islands out in mid-stream have disappeared altogether. Our own island's much smaller." ”

“ For several miles in either direction this mainland, as well as Storm Island itself, was either owned or leased by the Manatee Lumber Company. On the mainland the timber was properly policed by the company's guards; but Storm Island, far off shore, was considered secure from invasion by irresponsible fishing parties and the like, by the trespass signs posted upon its beaches. Blackport, the nearest town, ten miles from the western point of the island, was hidden from it by the wooded and rocky "crabclaw" sheltering Blackport Cove. ”

“ Since the publication of Anson's voyage, they have very much changed their opinion, finding a settlement in Pepys's, or Falkland's island, recommended by the author as necessary to the success of our future expeditions against the coast of Chili, and as such use and importance, that it would produce many advantages in peace, and, in war, would make us masters of the South sea.
Scarcely any degree of judgment is sufficient to restrain the imagination from magnifying that on which it is long detained. ”

“ The velocity of the stream is so great that one almost expects to see the islands swept bodily away. Big grey hawks circled ever over head and grey crows by the thousand lined the shores. That evening, after crossing and recrossing the river, we found a sheltered camp on a sandy island where pollards and willows roared in the wind. As if to show the loneliness of the spot an otter, rolling over and over among the eddies, swam past us as we landed. About sunset the clouds broke up momentarily and let out a flood of crimson light all over the wild country. ”

“ Land of People, Penguins and Sheep
The Falkland Islands are situated 13,000 kilometres from Bulgaria and 4,000 kilometres from the South Pole, their southernmost point being Beauchêne Island. The two main islands, West Falkland and East Falkland are separated by Falkland Sound, whose name was given more than three centuries ago by Captain John Strong who made the first ever landing on the islands in 1690. ”

“ Upon our return, we passed close to the little cove into which the boat had gone, and could readily discern through the trees a tent not far inland; in front of which were seated the two strangers, watching a pot hung over a fire made upon the ground. This excited an additional flutter of wonderment with us. Indeed, what we had seen, coupled with the current tradition regarding Money Island, soon wrought us up into a fever of excitement; for it was very suggestive of a search for the treasure on the island. ”

“ It is a far cry from the trepang and tropic birds (the salmon-pink bo’suns) of the northern rocks to the sea-lions that yawn at the casual visitor to Disappointment Island. The Kermadecs—to employ an overworked expression—bask in the smiles of perpetual summer. The Three Kings, lying thirty-eight miles beyond the tip of the North Island, might be Portuguese isles, and the Chathams—as far as climate goes—bits of France. But the peaty groups of the shivering South lie right across the pathway of the Antarctic gales. ”

“ After clearing the narrow passage between Cape Wilberforce and Bromby's Isles, we followed the main coast to the S. W.; having on the starbord hand some high and large islands, which closed in towards the coast ahead so as to make it doubtful whether there were any passage between them. Under the nearest island was perceived a canoe full of men; and in a sort of roadsted, at the south end of the same island, there were six vessels covered over like hulks, as if laid up for the bad season. ”

“ But the wind rose steadily, and next morning the spray was dashing over the vessel when we caught sight, through drifting clouds, of the shores of the Falkland Isles. They were wild and dreary shores bordered by rocky islands and scattered reefs, no dwellings anywhere visible on land, nor any boats on sea. In the afternoon, having passed, without seeing it, the mouth of the channel which separates the East from the West Falkland, we anchored in the deep bay which forms the outer harbour of Port Stanley, the chief harbour and village of the islands. ”

“ Well, about the Deadman’s Island affair. One Saturday afternoon in midsummer four of us—Robert Branks, a brother of Mrs. Doctor Powell, William Galley, James Estall and a fourth whose name I cannot now remember hired a boat at Lachapelle’s, near James Bay Bridge, and made for Deadman’s Island. We enjoyed the luxury of running about the island like the savages on Robinson Crusoe’s island, then dived into deep water, swam around for a time and landed to dry and warm ourselves at a fire we had made for that purpose. All boys know that a fire is indispensable to swimming and bathing. ”

“ Chub corrected. Harry clapped her hands.
“Couldn’t we call it that?” she asked eagerly.
“That’s its name henceforth,” replied Chub solemnly. “And we ought really to change the names of those islands there to Snip and Methuselah!”
“I’m afraid we can’t do that,” laughed Roy. “They’ve been called Treasure Island and Far Island for years.”
“I tell you, though,” cried Chub. “The Grapes [86] haven’t been named. There are eight of them. We’ll name those!”
They hurried past the point to where a cluster of tiny islets, the largest scarcely bigger than a barn door, lay just off the shore. ”

“ The Falklands archipelago is made up of two major islands, East Falkland and West Falkland, and several hundred smaller islands including Pebble Island, Keppel Island, Saunders Island, Carcass Island, West Point Island, Jason Islands, New Island, Beaver Island, Staats Island, Weddell Island, Swan Island, Speedwell Island, George Island, Beauchêne Island, Sea Lion Island, Bleaker Island, Lively Island etc. ”

“ It is of beautiful appearance, and the almost tropical profusion of its growth may have led to the early erroneous reports of the densely-wooded nature of these islands.
The population slightly exceeds 2000. The large majority of the inhabitants live in the East Island, and the predominating element is Scottish—Scottish shepherds having superseded the South American Gauchos. In 1867 there were no settlers on the west island, and the government issued a proclamation offering leases of grazing stations on very moderate terms. ”

“ Several white men have been killed, boats' crews cut off, vessels wrecked.
'We shall hear more of such doings; and really I can't blame the islanders. They are perfectly friendly to friends; though there is much suspicion shown even towards us, where we are not well known.
'As far as I can speak of my own plans, I hope to stay at Mota for a time, till the "Southern Cross" returns from Norfolk Island; then go to the Solomon Islands; return by way of Santa Cruz and probably Tikopia, to Mota; thence to Norfolk Island; thence probably to New Zealand, to take the steamer for Fiji. ”

“ Still people might exist on the other side of the island, or more inland.
They had been advised not to venture on shore on any island, unless the inhabitants had become Christians, without arms. Owen and Elton proposed on this occasion going without them, as they were heavy to carry.
“No, no!” said Charley. “A rule is a rule, which, if a good one, should never be broken through.”
This was the first island where, by their calculations, they had the slightest chance of finding Jack Askew, at least, it was about the longitude that the Truelove was supposed to have been lost. ”

“ The observations of the French and English navigators agree exactly as to the position of these smaller isles.--D.]
[Footnote 101: The situation of Kerguelen's Isle de Clugny, as marked on this chart, shews it to be the third high island seen by Captain Cook.--D.]
We did but just weather the island last mentioned. It is a high round rock, which was named Bligh's Cap. Perhaps this is the same that Monsieur de Kerguelen called the Isle of Rendezvous; [102] but I know nothing that can rendezvous at it, but fowls of the air; for it is certainly inaccessible to every other animal. ”