About nine o’clock at night, there being then a dead calm, I heard distinctly the beat of a screw propeller, accompanied by the regular blowing at slow intervals of escaping steam. I looked all about for the vessel, and presently made out her mast-head light, like a star quivering on the horizon. Gradually it lifted above the water in the southern sky, and I knew it would pass me quite near at hand unless its course were changed. There were still some embers of my fire alight, and nothing would have been easier than to make a signal which doubtless would have been seen on board. But though I gathered the embers together instinctively, I took no step toward making the signal. She drew nearer and nearer, and finally passed along the coast not half a mile distant, trailing a long plume of smoke. So near was she at one time that in the starlight and upon the light of the sea I could distinguish her form and build, and conjectured that she was some ocean tramp, sliding along stern deep down, and nose cocked out of the water, looking for a cargo from port to port,--an iron steamer, such as are sent out by thousands now-a-days to wander over all the seas and oceans, and which, going from port to port, finally return to the home port, perhaps when it is time to lay their sides and ribs into the junk heap for old iron.
When the moon rose the steamer was a pale, gray spot at the end of a long stain of dark smoke far in the northern horizon. It finally disappeared, the smoke fading away and mingling with the faint mist-wreaths that stole up from the sea under the moonlight. I went to bed on the rock with Duke coiled up beside me, and slept until broad day. I found the water still too high for me to descend safely to the sand; the tide had apparently gone out and was coming in again. I did not much like the idea of descending again to the foot of the cliff if it could be avoided, because there was no telling whether I could safely proceed farther to the north; nor was I yet ready to go back home, for I intended, if possible, to make the complete circuit of the island.
Therefore I turned my attention to that portion of the cliff that rose above my ledge. After a careful scrutiny I concluded it would be possible to reach the top by climbing a tree that grew close to the rock. A narrow ledge could be reached from the upper limbs, and it led along the face of the rocks for a few steps to a sort of crack or chasm up which one might easily clamber to the top. I climbed down to the beach as soon as the water was low enough, and filled my bottle anew at the spring, Duke howling and barking all the time, as though in great distress at being deserted. I returned to the ledge, fastened the end of the lasso around the dog, and climbed up the tree with my lance, haversack, and water bottle. With some difficulty I reached the chasm safely, and proceeded to haul up the dog. From there the climbing was not difficult to the top.