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Starting Out With Visual C#, 5th Edition Page 2

True or False
1. False
2. True
3. True
4. False
5. True
6. False
7. True
8. False
9. False
10. False
11. False
12. True

Short Answer
1. Because without it, the computer could not run software.
2. A bit that is turned on represents 1, and a bit that is turned off represents 0.
3. A digital device
4. Keywords
5. mnemonics
6. A compiler is a program that translates a high-level language program into a separate machine
language program. The machine language program can then be executed any time it is needed.
An interpreter is a program that both translates and executes the instructions in a high-level
language program. As the interpreter reads each individual instruction in the program, it
converts it to a machine language instruction and then immediately executes it. Because
interpreters combine translation and execution, they typically do not create separate machine
language programs.
7. Operating system
8. Pseudocode is an informal language used to write out the steps of an algorithm. A flowchart is a
diagram that graphically depicts the steps of an algorithm.
9. In a text-based environment, such as a command line interface, programs determine the order
in which things happen.
10. A class specifies the data that an object can hold (the object’s fields and properties), and the
actions that an object can perform (the object’s methods).
11. No, because C# provides only the basic keywords and operators that you need to construct a
program. In addition to the C# language, you need the .NET Framework. The .NET Framework is
a collection of classes and other code that can be used, along with a programming language
such as C#, to create programs for the Windows operating system.
12. (1) The Toolbox
(2) The Designer window
(3) The Solution Explorer
(4) The Properties window
13. The Toolbox is a window that allows you to select the controls that you want to use in an
application’s user interface.
14. You can access the documentation for Visual Studio by Clicking Help on the menu bar, and then
selecting View Help. (Or, you can press Ctrl+F1, and then press V on the keyboard.) The MSDN

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Education, Inc.

Starting Out With Visual C#, 5th Edition Page 3

library provides complete documentation for Visual C#, as well as the other programming
languages included in Visual Studio.
15. If Visual Studio is already running, you can perform the following steps to open an existing
project:

 Click File on the Visual Studio menu bar, then select Open, then select Project/Solution...
 The Open Project window will appear. Navigate to the desired solution folder, select the
solution file, and click Open.

In Visual C# Express, perform the following steps to open an existing project:

 Click File on the Visual Studio menu bar, then select Open Project...
 The Open Project window will appear. Navigate to the desired solution folder, select the
solution file, and click Open.

16. Right-click Form1.cs in the Solution Explorer, and then click View Designer in the pop-up menu.

Exercises

1. Decimal Binary
11 1011
65 1000001
100 1100100
255 11111111

2. Binary Decimal
1101 13
1000 8
101011 43

3. Here is an example: The ASCII codes for the name Marty are:
M = 77
a = 97
r = 114
t = 226
y = 121

4. a. The three test scores

b. It will add the three test scores, and divide the sum by three.
c. It will display the result of the calculation performed in b.

Copyright © 2020 Pearson Education, Inc.

Random documents with unrelated
content Scribd suggests to you:
‘No, no, Captain Marion,’ interrupted she, smiling shyly up at him,
‘we don’t want that either.’

‘Ah, I see!’ exclaimed the Captain, after a pause, ‘a conspiracy! Well,’

he went on, after a still longer hesitation, ‘I don’t care much about
it. The telling, I mean, of how I got this’ (touching his hair) ‘and
these’ (spreading out his hands), ‘for, of course, that is what you
wish to hear. It reminds me of a time I would rather not recall.

‘No, Miss Hillier’—for the girl had risen in dismay and almost tears at
her thoughtlessness, and was attempting to apologise incoherently
enough—‘it doesn’t matter a bit. Besides, I somehow feel in the vein
for story-telling this evening; and as well that as anything else. With
some
233 passengers, I find that I have to put a stopper on their
curiosity rather abruptly. But’ (with a grave smile and a bow to the
group) ‘it being a rare thing, indeed, to meet so well-assorted and
pleasant a party as we are this trip, I’ll spin you the yarn, such as it
is. And now, Miss Hillier, my song.’

‘What would you like—the same as usual, I suppose—“The Silent

Land?”’

‘Yes,’ answered the Captain; ‘your rendering puts a new

interpretation on Salis’ words for me, and I seem to bear with me
more strongly than ever the promise, as I listen, that he

Who in life’s battle firm doth stand

Shall bear Hope’s tender blossoms
Into the Silent Land!’

. . . . . . . . . .

‘It is,’ commenced Captain Marion, the song finished, and taking his
accustomed seat, whilst the others gathered round him—‘It is nearly
fourteen years ago that the strange, and what many may deem
improbable, adventure happened which I am about to relate. I was
then about twenty-two years of age, an able-bodied seaman on
board a ship called the Bucephalus, belonging to Liverpool. It was
my first voyage before the mast, for, although I had duly served my
apprenticeship with the firm who owned her, and also passed my
exam. as second mate, there was no vacancy just then open. They,
indeed, offered me a post as third; but, knowing that I should be
none
234 the worse for a month or two in the fok’s’le, I preferred to ship
as an A.B. The Bucephalus was an Eastern trader, and on this trip
was bound for Singapore and China. All went well with us until we
entered the Straits of Sunda. Then, one afternoon, the ship lying in
a dead calm off one of the many lovely islands which abound in
those narrow seas, the passengers, chiefly military officers with their
families, asked the captain to let them have a boat and a run ashore.

‘He was a good-natured man, and consented. Luckily for me, as it

afterwards proved, the gig, a very old boat, was full of lumber, fruit,
fowls, etc., procured at Anjer, and so the life-boat, a stanch, nearly
new craft, was put into the water instead.

‘At the last moment some one suggested that a cup of tea might be
acceptable on the island. Not tea alone, but provisions for an ample
meal were at once handed in, together with a keg of fresh water.
This also was, as you will discover presently, another lucky or—ought
I not to say?—providential, chance for me.

‘With myself, three more seamen, and eight or nine ladies and
gentlemen, we pushed off towards the verdant, cone-shaped island.
Landing without any difficulty on a shell-strewn beach which ran up
between two lofty and abrupt headlands, all hands, except myself
and an elderly seaman known as Tom, jumped ashore and went
climbing and scampering about like so many schoolboys out for a
holiday. For my part, I had been on scores of similar islands, or
imagined I had, and felt no particular wish to explore this one.
Neither,
235 apparently, did my companion. So, hauling off a little from
the shore, we threw the grapnel overboard and prepared to take
things easy, each in his own fashion, he with a pipe, and I with a
book lent me by one of the cabin passengers.
‘We made a rough sort of awning with the boat’s sail, and I lay in
the stern-sheets, my companion between the midship thwarts, under
its grateful shelter. It was a drowsy afternoon and a very hot one. To
our ears the shouts and laughter of those ashore came at intervals,
gradually growing fainter as they made their way towards the
summit of the mountain, for such one might say the island was.

‘Presently, looking up from my book, I saw that old Tom was fast
asleep, his pipe still in his mouth. Very shortly afterwards I dozed,
and heard the book drop from my hand on to the grating without
making any effort to recover it. I fell asleep in the broad sunlit day,
between ship and land, in the motionless boat, with the voices of my
kind still in my ears, and awoke in thickest darkness, moving swiftly
along in utter silence, save for, at times, an oily gurgle of water
under the bows. Not that I realised even so much all at once. It took
me some time. I thought I must be still dreaming, and lay there
staring into the blackness with unbelieving eyes. Then I pinched
myself and struck my hands sharply against the thwarts. But it was
of no use. I could not convince myself that I was not the victim of
some ghastly nightmare. Then the idea came into my mind that,
although awake, I had suddenly become blind; that Tom had gone
ashore
236 for a stroll, and that the boat, drifting, had been carried out
to sea by some current. Under the influence of this notion, I leaped
to my feet, only to be at once struck down again, as if by a hand of
iron. Although not completely stunned, I was, for a few minutes,
quite bewildered. I could feel, too, that my head was bleeding freely.
Sitting cautiously up, I called “Tom!” I listened intently, but nothing
was audible save the faint gurgling sound of the water. I called
repeatedly, but there was no answer. Suddenly I recollected that in
my pocket was a large metal box full of matches—long wax vestas.

‘Striking one, I held it aloft and gazed eagerly about me. I thanked
God that I was not blind. But, so far as I could see, I was alone.

‘On each side, and a foot or so above my head, barely visible in the
feeble glimmer, were swiftly passing walls of dripping rock, covered,
in many places, with huge clusters of shiny weeds. So amazed was I
at my perfectly inexplicable situation that I stared until the match
burned my fingers and dropped into the water, whilst I fell back
quite overcome by astonishment and fright.

‘Then, after a bit, I struck more matches. But things were just the
same. Always the rocky weed-grown sides, sometimes within touch,
at others seeming to widen out; always the rocky, dripping roof,
sometimes at my head, at others out of sight; always the darkness,
the hurrying boat, and the water like liquid pitch.

‘Unable
237 to see thoroughly over the boat, I presently crawled for’ard,
feeling, as I went, under the sail which had fallen over the thwarts.
As I feared, I found no one.

‘Groping about, I picked up Tom’s pipe. And then I feared the worst
for him.

‘The darkness was horrible. It was so thick that one seemed to

swallow mouthfuls of it. The atmosphere was close and muggy, with
a smell reminding me strongly of a tannery. Although lightly clad, I
was bathed in perspiration as I half sat, half crouched, at the boat’s
stern, straining my eyes ahead, and now and again lighting one of
my matches. Time nor distance had any meaning for me, now; and I
have no idea how long I had been voyaging in this unnatural
fashion, when there fell on my ears the loud threatening roar of
many waters. Commending my soul to God, I laid myself in the
boat’s bottom. The next minute she seemed to stand nearly upright
and then shoot downward like a flash, whilst thick spray flew in
showers over me, and the imprisoned waters roared and howled
with deafening clamour adown the narrow chasm, so narrow that
more than once, in her headlong course, I heard splinters fly from
the boat’s timbers, whilst masses of dank weeds detached by the
blows fell upon me.
‘I now,’ continued the Captain, after a pause, during which he
glanced from the ‘tell-tale’ compass overhead to the attentive,
wondering
238 faces of his audience—‘I now gave myself up for lost, or,
at least, imagined that I did so. But the love of life is strong indeed
within us; so that when after shooting this subterranean cataract, or
whatever it might have been, I found my boat once more steadily
gliding along, ever with the same dull gurgle of cleft water at her
bows, a faint ray of hope took the place of despairing calm. I was
young, remember; healthy, too, powerful and agile beyond the
common, and I felt it would be hard indeed to die like a rat in that
black hole. What accentuated the hope I speak of was the fact that
the lessening roar of the torrent I had just passed sounded as if
directly overhead. In vain I told myself that it was but a deceptive
echo. Hope would have her say, and buoyed me up, though ever so
little, with the idea, incredible as it seemed, that this horrible
underground river had doubled back beneath itself, and was making
for the sea once more. It has well been said that drowning men will
clutch at straws! This one, indeed, was soon to fail me; for presently,
to my utter despair, the noise of tumultuous waters ahead gave
warning of another cataract—another, or the same one, for, what
with the din and the darkness, I became quite confused. The
passage was a repetition of the last one, only, if anything, rougher;
and, crushed in spirit, all courage flown, I sank back, listening to the
rush of the falling water dying away overhead again. Was I, I
wondered,
239 descending to even lower depths of earth’s bowels in this
fashion, or merely driven to and fro at the caprice of some
remorseless current in what was to prove my tomb! I believe that,
for a time, under the stress of ideas like this, my mind wandered; for
I have a vague remembrance of singing comic songs, of shouting
defiance to fate, the darkness, and things generally; behaving, in
fact, like the lunatic I must have become. Whether I descended any
more rapids or not I cannot say. I have no recollection whatever of
the last part of my strange journey. When, however, I came to my
sober senses again I was at the end of it. The boat was motionless,
and I was standing upright in her.’
At this point in the Captain’s story, and while the interest of his
hearers was at its height, the chief officer came quietly in, and,
catching his superior’s eye, as quietly made his way out again.

Now, four bells struck, and the Captain exclaimed, ‘What, ten o’clock
already! My yarn has somewhat spun itself out, and I’m afraid the
rest must keep for another evening.’

At this there was quite a chorus of remonstrance. ‘It was cruel to

have excited their curiosity and leave it unsatisfied,’ was the general
verdict.

‘No sleep for me to-night,’ said Miss Hillier; ‘I shall be wandering

through that horrid place in my thoughts, and puzzling my brain to
discover how you got out, unless I know the sequel.’

‘It
240 grieves me to think of your disturbed rest,’ replied the Captain,

with a bow and a quizzical smile, ‘although honoured by the cause of

it. I am afraid, however, I must refuse even you. I saw heavy
weather just now in Mr Santley’s eye; and the ship, you know,
before all.’

Then the sound of ropes thrown heavily on deck was heard,

together with tramp of feet and shouting, the ship heeled over, and
the Captain went out, and was not again seen that night by his
passengers.

The Second Evening.

Close-reefed top-sails, with a wild, high sea, met on ‘rounding the
corner,’ did not prevent the Corona’s passengers from putting in an
appearance the next evening to hear the continuation of the
Captain’s story.
‘Well,’ he remarked, as he took his seat, ‘this yarn of mine seems to
bring us luck, judging by the way we exchanged our trades last night
for this rattling westerly breeze that is now taking us round the Cape
so nicely. I think I left off my story,’ continued the Captain, ‘as the
boat came to a stop in her travels, through the darkness.’

‘I had recovered from my temporary fit of madness, and was

standing up. I was trembling violently, and my limbs felt cramped
and stiff. I fancy I must have been a long time on the journey, for I
was
241 sick and faint, principally from want of food. The air, though still

heavy and warm, was not so oppressive as it had been. But the
former silence was broken by the most unearthly noises imaginable,
sobbings, deep cavernous groans, and hoarse whistlings resounded
on every side. For a long time I did not stir. I just stood listening
with all my ears, and expecting every moment that something awful
was going to take place.

‘After a while, slightly reassured, and feeling the boat’s bows

scraping some hard substance, I crept into them, and putting out my
hand, and groping about alongside, felt a mass of smooth
honeycombed stone. Striking a match, the possession of which, in
my confused state of mind, I had almost forgotten, I got hold of the
painter and took a couple of turns around a projecting ledge of rock.

‘Then I scooped up a handful of water and tasted it. It was as bitter

as gall, also quite lukewarm. Happily that in the breaker was
unspoiled. Rummaging about, I found the case of eatables also
intact; and, sitting there in profound darkness, made a meal of
cheese and white biscuits, listening between the mouthfuls to the
mysterious noises, whose origin, however, I was now enabled pretty
well to guess at.

‘It was very warm, and the tannery smell more powerful than ever. A
sensation of surrounding vastness and space, however, was with me
as opposed to the confined cramped feeling of being in a narrow
channel, such as I suppose myself to have emerged from. Now, I
could
242 stand upright and thrust an oar out and upwards without
touching anything; and, shouting aloud, the sound went echoing and
thundering away over the surface of the water with reverberations
lasting for minutes.

‘I can take you into that place,’ continued the Captain impressively,
‘and tell you about it as far as my poor words will serve. But I
cannot tell you my feelings. At times I almost imagined that I was in
Hades, and that the ceaseless noises about me were the cries and
groans of lost souls therein. At others, a wild, forlorn hope would
seize me, that it might all turn out to be only a horrible dream, and
that I should presently awake to see God’s dear sun shining brightly
on the gallant ship and the green island once more. It had all
happened with such startling rapidity, the transformation had been
so utter and complete, that to this day I wonder I did not become a
raving madman, and so perish miserably down there in the depths.
But God in His infinite mercy took pity upon me, and brought me at
the last out of such a prison as it is given to few men to see, much
less escape from.

‘Like the majority of seafarers, I, in those days, seldom troubled my

head about what is vaguely called “religion.”

‘The careful and pious teachings of my childhood had been forgotten

almost wholly. But, in that awesome place, in solitude and misery,
bound with darkness of Scripture, “that might be felt,” many things
came
243 back to me; and, kneeling down, I clasped my hands and
prayed fervently that I might be saved out of the valley of the
shadow of death which encompassed me. Feeling better and
stronger, I took my sheath-knife, and with it cut away at one of the
oars until I had quite a respectable pile of chips. Placing this on the
rock alongside, I set it on fire, and soon had the satisfaction of
seeing it blaze cheerfully up and, for a few yards, dispel the
darkness. I kept adding fuel from the same source, with the addition
of a couple of stretchers, until I had a really good-sized fire. By its
light I saw that I was on a flat rock some twenty feet in
circumference. Round about were other islets, shaped most
fantastically. One, close to, resembled a gigantic horseshoe; another
towered up, the perfect similitude of a church spire, into the
darkness. At their bases were holes, into and through which the
water, flowing and ebbing, produced the sounds that at first had so
alarmed me. Look as I might, I could not distinguish the way I had
come in, although I thought I could hear the steady pouring of a
volume of water not far away. Breaking off a lump of the stone on
which I sat, I examined it closely, and felt pretty certain that it was
lava. I had seen such before at Mauna Loa, in the Sandwich Islands.

‘Was I then in the womb of a volcano, extinct just at present,

doubtless; but, perhaps, even now, taking in water preparatory to
generating steam and becoming active? Somewhere in my reading I
had dropped across an article on seismology, and one of the theories
put forward came to mind as above.

‘The idea made my flesh creep!

‘I244seemed to feel the air, the water, and my lump of lava getting
hotter and hotter.

‘Hopeless as my case appeared, and almost resigned to face the end

as I had become, even so, I did by no means relish a private view of
the preliminaries to a volcanic eruption.

‘Strangely inconsistent, you will say, but so it was. When face to

face, even with the last scene of all, it seems there can yet be
something of which one may be afraid.

‘Meanwhile, my beacon blazed up brightly, and, peering around, I

presently made out a pile of stuff apparently floating against the
base of one of the nearest islets.

‘Taking a flaring fire-stick, I got into the boat and sculled over to it.
It was a heap of driftwood. Lowering my torch to examine the stuff
more closely, I nearly pitched overboard, as, out of the reddish-black
water within the ragged patch of light, a white, dead face gazed up
at me with wide-open, staring eyes. I recognised it at once as that
of my old shipmate. Tom, on awaking, had evidently been knocked
out of the boat and drowned, as so nearly happened to myself. The
current had as evidently carried him here with me.

‘I leaned over the gunwale as if fascinated. What would I not have

given for his living companionship now!

‘Lifting, at last, one of the stiff arms, I shook the unresponsive hand
in245silent farewell, and paddled back towards the flame that marked
my islet, actually feeling envious of the quiet corpse. Misfortune
makes us sadly selfish, and so little had my thoughts ran on the fate
of my comrade that the shock of his appearance thus was a heavy
one.

‘I took it as a bad omen, and what spirit I had nearly left me.

‘After sitting motionless on my rock for a very long time, with my

head bowed on my knees, and nearly letting my fire go out, I shook
myself together a little, threw more chips on, and examined my
stores.

‘All told, with cheese, biscuits, several tins of potted meat and
preserves, I reckoned there was enough, on meagre allowance, to
last me for a week. Water about the same.

‘More than once I felt tempted to throw the lot overboard and follow
it.

‘But youth and health and strength are indeed wondrous things, and
a man possessed of them will do and dare much before giving up
entirely, no matter how drear the outlook, how sharp the arrows of
fate which transfix him!

‘Feeling weary and fagged, I lay down in the boat and slept, I
suppose, for hours very soundly.
‘The awaking was bad—worse even than the first time.

‘One thing comforted me somewhat. I found that by the constant

endeavour to use my eyes in the darkness I was becoming able to
discern at least the dim outlines of objects.

‘Renewing
246 the fire with a lot of driftwood I picked up at the further
side of my islet, I proceeded to carry out a plan I had formed.
Taking the gratings out of the stern-sheets, I arranged them firmly in
the bows. Then, breaking off projecting lumps and knobs of lava, I
beat them smaller with an iron pin, which I fortunately found in the
boat, and spread them thickly over the gratings, thus forming a sort
of stage. Upon this I built a substantial fire. I was, you see, bound
on a voyage of exploration.

‘There might, possibly, be some avenue to freedom out of this

subterranean sea other than the one I had entered it from, exit by
which was, of course, hopeless.

‘It was, I argued, useless to stay on the rock. I could not be much
worse off, no matter where I got to.

‘How I yearned and hungered for light no tongue could tell. It

seemed so hard to wander in the gloom for a brief night of
existence. And then, the end! Do you, any of you, wonder at my hair
turning grey?

‘As I scraped the last embers off the islet on to the tin dish used as a
baler, in order to throw them on the new fire, the light fell full upon
the corpse, which, to all appearance, had just floated alongside.

‘My nerves were evidently getting unstrung by what I had gone

through, for, letting the dish fall, I shouted with terror, and, jumping
into the boat, pushed wildly away from the poor body. To my
unutterable
247 dismay it followed me, with one arm extended and
raised slightly, as if in deprecation of my desertion of it.
‘I have thought at times,’ remarked the Captain parenthetically, ‘of
what a picture the scene would make—the boat floating in a patch
of crimson water, with the fire flaring into the blackness on her
bows, myself standing up grasping an oar, and gazing intently at the
nearly nude body as it came closer and closer, and everywhere
around the thick darkness.

‘I think that in another moment I should have leapt overboard, so

great was my fright, but that I happened to catch sight of a piece of
rope leading from the boat to the body.

‘Getting hold of it, I pulled, and the corpse came also. Then I
understood. On my leaving it the first time a portion of the sail
halliards, which had been towing overhead, had got foul of the body,
and, unperceived, I had brought it back to my islet with me.

‘My presence of mind returned, and, not caring to run the risk of
more surprises of the sort, I again landed, and pulled the body on to
the islet.

‘There must have been some preserving agent in that water, for,
despite the heat, there was no sign of decomposition, and the
features were as fresh as in life.

‘Sculling gently along, with my fire blazing bravely and comfortingly

at the bow, I set off into the unknown.

‘For
248 a time my attention was thoroughly taken up in trying to avoid

the numerous lava islets, whose presence I could scarcely detect

until right upon them. Indeed, once or twice we bumped heavily
enough to send showers of hot ashes hissing into the water.

‘At last, after a long spell of this kind of blind navigation, I seemed to
get clearer of these provoking islets. The noises also, to which I was
becoming quite accustomed, nearly ceased.
‘As I sculled warily along, I listened with all my ears for some
indication of a return current. It was my one hope, and it kept every
sense on the alert.

‘But the water within the radius of my so limited vision was quiet
and still as in a covered reservoir—much more so, now, indeed, than
at my old resting-place. This fact I accounted for by the emptying
near there of the underground, possibly under-sea river, which had
brought me into such an awful fix.

‘Presently the boat bumped more violently than ever, and by the
flame-light which shot up from the disturbed fire, I saw, rising far
aloft, a solid wall of rock. No lava islet this, but the end of all—the
boundary, in this direction, of my prison.

‘To right and left stretched the same grim barrier, dropping sheer
down into the still black water. With a sinking heart I turned the
boat’s head along the wall to my right hand, keeping a little distance
out, moving very slowly, with just a turn or two of the oar, sufficient
only to keep way on her.
248a

The light fell full upon the corpse. (Page 246.)

‘It
249 may have been minutes, or it may have been hours, when,

straight ahead, over the somewhat feeble light of my fire, which had
proved, after all, more help by way of company than use, I imagined
the darkness looked thinner. Inspired by the mere idea, I sculled
vigorously along, at the risk of complete wreck from some sunken
rock, and in a short time the boat shot into an oblong-shaped streak
of light—light, that is, comparatively, for it was as dim as starlight;
although, so acclimatised, if I may use the term, had my eyes
become to the denser medium, that by its aid I could see clearly
every article in the boat.

‘I will not trouble you with a description of my feelings, nor of all the
extravagancies I committed in the first flush of delighted hope that
had visited me. I seemed to be once more in touch with the upper
world through that column of dim greyness ascending through the
darkness, and so weak as hardly to be able to conquer it.’

Here the Captain paused. He had told his story well; seldom at a loss
for a word, and with now and again, but rarely, an appropriate
gesture.

So successful had he been in gaining the attention of his listeners,

that, when he ceased, they sat quite silent, gazing at him fixedly,
and for some minutes no one spoke.

Then four bells, which struck on deck during a lull in the roar of the
gale,
250 came with such sudden distinctness to their ears, as to make
some of the ladies start and utter timid little ejaculations.

The spell broken, a chorus of tongues clamoured out. Miss Hillier

alone was silent. Then some dear foolish female affinity said, ‘Why,
Amy, love, you’ve been crying!’ This the girl, with flaming cheeks
denied, only the next minute to affirm, quite inconsequently, that if
she had wept (which she was certain she had not), was not such a
tale enough to make one, with any heart at all, shed tears?
 The Third Evening.
East by S-½-South, under fore and main courses and upper and
lower top-sails, sped the Corona with the wind on her quarter. Aft,
rose great water-hills, darkly green, with white crests, seeming, as
each followed each, to hang momentarily suspended over the stern
and threaten to overwhelm everything; then, as the good ship rose
just in the nick of time, breaking with a long surge in sheets of milky
foam away for’ard.

The sun was setting sullenly behind a dense cloud-bank. An

albatross or two flew screaming from one wave-crest to another
right in the wake. It was a typical evening in the Southern Ocean,
the long wash of whose seas reach from the foot of Cape Leuwin to
the rugged cliffs of Fuego.

‘Well,’
251
continued the Captain, without any preface, as he took his
seat facing the waiting and expectant little party.

‘Well, stare as I might aloft, I could not discover to where this

Jacob’s ladder led. You see, at its best, it was only a column of dusky
twilight, and the further end, from where I stood, was lost to view.
As I gazed, it appeared to be gradually fading away. I rubbed my
eyes; and when I again looked, all around was blacker than the
blackest midnight, except where my fire still burned. For a while, I
was puzzled to account for the disappearance of the light. Then the
thought struck me that it might be caused by the fall of night in the
upper world. Was I, I wondered, as I turned sadly to my fire, ever
again to look upon the bright day, the sun, the moon, the stars, and
all the wonders of that fair earth now grown so dear to me? Truly
was I one of those unhappy men who, as the Psalmist says, “sit in
darkness and in the shadow of death, being bound in affliction and
iron.”

‘Close to the pillar of light, just on its outside edge, I had noticed a
long, slender, almost perpendicular pinnacle of lava towering
upwards like the spire of a church.

‘At the base of this I securely moored my boat. Then, thinking that a
cup of tea would cheer me up a little, I brewed one, and made a
good meal. After this, lying down, I pondered many things, gazing
always aloft.

‘Once
252 I imagined I saw a star; but it disappeared before I could
make sure.

‘The one question uppermost in my mind was whether or not the

glimmer would reappear when the morning broke above, or had it
been an illusion? One thing encouraged me to hope for the best. It
was perceptibly cooler, a grateful change from the warm mugginess
I had encountered everywhere else. I had, by this, contracted a
habit of talking aloud, and I presently caught myself saying that I
would climb the lava pinnacle in the morning and try to get a better
look-out.

‘“In the morning.”

‘The utter vanity of the so familiar phrase as it fell on my ears struck

me with all the force of some terrible shock, whilst the cold
deadening thought seized upon me that, for me, in this world, there
was to be no more morning. Through darkness was I to make the
last journey towards that dread bourne whence no traveller returns?
The slow death in the darkness, drifting about on the bitter waters
of that secret sea—that was the thought that my soul revolted from.
And strange thoughts, horrible thoughts, a man thinks placed as I
was. At times his reason leaves him, his whole soul rises in impious
revolt, and the devil rages freely therein, as if already his victim’s
bed were made in hell.

‘But, thanks be to God!’ exclaimed the Captain, fervently, ‘that the

recollections of that hideous time—of the fits of doubt and despair
and
253 terror and madness, of which I have said but little to you—grow
dimmer and weaker with the years, leaving only in enduring relief
the memory of a great mercy!

‘It pleased me, though, unproved as it was, that notion of being able
to distinguish between night and daylight. The very fact, pure
conjecture though it might be, of having the power to say, “Night
has come,” seemed to bring peace to my wearied eyes; so that I
presently lay down and slept dreamlessly, and on awakening found
again, to my intense joy, that mild, soft haze falling upon me.

‘Scarcely giving myself time to snatch a mouthful of biscuit and a

draught of cold tea, I jumped ashore and commenced the ascent of
the tapering mass of rock. It was, as I have said, nearly
perpendicular, and there was no lack of foot and hand-holds—
projections sharp as razors, formed by the drippings of the once
molten lava. Thanks to my trained vision and the help afforded by
the close proximity of the light, I could see dimly. Higher up, the
projecting spurs and knobs grew scarcer, and the surface more
smooth and slippery. It was terrible work. At home I had had some
practice as a cragsman, and this stood to me well now. As I climbed,
sometimes vertically, at others spirally, wherever I could feel the
firmest hold, the atmosphere grew palpably clearer, and this infused
new strength into my aching limbs as I crawled upwards, now
hanging by one bleeding hand over the abyss beneath me, now with
both
254 hands breathlessly embracing some sharp spur that cut into my
flesh, whilst my feet groped convulsively for precarious support.

‘When just about spent, I unexpectedly came to the top. I found

only room enough there to sit down and pant. A wild hope had filled
my breast that this rocky ladder would lead me to liberty—a hope
growing stronger with every upward step. As I looked around, these
hopes fell, and the old leaden weight of despair seemed to settle
once more upon my soul. Slanting away from me on every side,
stretched the rugged acclivities of a vast amphitheatre, converging
again towards its summit, where the blue sky was distinctly visible.
Picture to yourselves an hour-glass with a long tunnel-like waist.
Place a straw, the end of which rests on the bottom of the lower
section of the glass and reaches up through the tunnel until just on
a level with the sloping-upward portion of the top section, but
touching it nowhere. Now place a minute insect on the very tip of
the straw, and you have my situation as nearly as I can explain it to
you. And there I crouched on my lava straw, stretching out
unavailing hands to those scarred cliffs of liberty, betwixt me and
which spread that dark abyss, with the mournful waters of the bitter
sea at its foot. The distance between where I sat on the top of the
pinnacle and the sloping walls of the crater all round must have been
about twenty five feet. I think it was afterwards measured as that. A
hundred plans darted swiftly into my mind for crossing this little
space, which meant so much to me, only to be as quickly dismissed
as impracticable.

‘Although
255 still very far from day, it was yet light enough to let me see
that the sides of the crater, nearly equi-distant around my perch,
were cut and ploughed into deep furrows, and that, once there, I
should have comparatively little trouble in reaching upper air.

‘Would it be possible, I wondered, to splice what remained of the

oars together, and thus make some kind of a bridge along which to
creep? But the idea of again facing such a climb with such an
unwieldy burden made me shudder. Also, I doubted much if there
was length enough to reach across, supposing I ever got them to
where I was. This one amongst many other plans. All at once, as I
sat gazing alternately at the far, far away patch of blue overhead,
and the dark rocks opposite, there flashed across my thoughts the
recollection of the boat’s grapnel. I had seen nothing of it. But it
might still be hanging under her bows. Attached to the stern-post by
a short length of chain shackled to a ring-bolt, it would have taken a
heavy shock to shift it. If I could but get a line across and, by help
of the grapnel, firmly secured to the opposite side, I felt I was
saved. Tearing up the light dungaree jumper I was wearing, and
which, with the remainder of my clothing, was little else but a rag, I
bound pieces around my stiff and wounded hands and feet, and
commenced the descent. It was an awful journey, worse than the
coming up. Then, my skin was whole, at the start, anyhow; now, the
cuts and tears re-opened and bled and stung more than ever. At one
time,
256 indeed, I felt that I must give up and let go. But the thought of
the grapnel appeared to endue me with fresh strength, whilst, in my
mind’s eye, I kept steadfastly the memory of that dear glimpse of
blue sky. At length, looking down and pausing for a moment, I saw a
flicker of light. It was from the dying embers of my fire, and, in a
few minutes, I was in the boat. Although nearly utterly exhausted,
crawling for’ard, I felt for the chain. It was there; and pulling it
rapidly in, what was my delight to find the little grapnel still at its
end. Replenishing my fire, I made some tea, preparatory to having
something to eat, for I knew I should want all my strength presently.
In hauling at the chain my hands had got wet, and, to my surprise,
the bleeding had ceased, and the pain almost departed. I
immediately bathed my feet, and felt wonderfully relieved thereby.
Now, I had my tea, and then considered whether it might not be
wiser to pass the night where I was, and take a full day for my
attempt. God knows how eager I was for the moment of trial to
arrive! Still, I chose the prudent side, and sat and watched the hazy
column turn first to a dull green, then to ashen grey, then go out
suddenly, and so I knew, certainly now, that the day was over on the
earth.

‘As the darkness, thick and impenetrable, closed me in, I lay down
thinking to sleep a little, but my rest was disturbed and broken.
Always, as I dozed off, I was clambering painfully up that terrible
rock, with bleeding hands and feet, staggering under huge burdens
of
257rope and iron. Once I dreamt that my shipmate’s body had floated

off the islet, and was, even now, with white clammy fingers, striving
to lift itself into the boat, whilst the ghastly face peered at me over
the side. This effectually awoke me; but so strong was the
impression, that I seized a fire-stick, and, making it blaze up,
searched sharply around. I had my trouble for my pains. But further
attempt at sleep for me was out of the question.
‘My dawn, such as it was, came at last. I had already detached the
grapnel from its chain, and unrove the halliards from the mast.
These last I wound round and round my body, fully thirty feet of
line, small “Europe” rope, but tough and strong. The disposal of my
precious grapnel, which, luckily, was one of the smallest of its kind,
only used, as we had used it, for a temporary holdfast, bothered me
a good deal.

‘Finally, I placed my head between two of the flukes, one of which

then rested on each shoulder, whilst the stock hung down my back,
swinging loosely. To make sure of the flukes not slipping, I passed a
piece of line from one to the other, and knotted it securely.

‘It was a most uncomfortable fixture altogether, a tight fit for my

neck into the bargain, but I could think of no other way.

‘I’m not going to inflict upon you a detailed description of how I

reached the top—I believe it must have been fully five hundred feet
—carrying that half-hundred weight of iron, to say nothing of the
rope.
258 Indeed, I hardly know myself. However, get there I did; but, as
you may guess, in a very evil plight.

‘I recollect, when still some thirty feet from the top, unable to bear
any longer the horrible chafing of the flukes, which had broken
through the skin, and were grinding against the bone, that I rested,
or, rather, balanced myself on a sharp ledge, whilst casting the
grapnel adrift from my shoulders, and unwinding the rope from my
body. Then, making one end of the line fast to the ring in the stock,
I fastened the other round my waist, the grapnel all this time resting
loosely on the rock.

‘Leaving it there, and paying out the line cautiously into the void
below me, away I went again, bracing myself at every step to
withstand the awful jerk should the grapnel slip off, and tighten the
rope with the momentum of its fall. If such a thing had happened,
and the chances were many, my fate was certain—a few scrambling
clutches and annihilation. But where it went I had made up my mind
to go also.

‘It was my only and last hope, that bit of crooked four-clawed iron!
Death was in every step I took, and I believe that it was in those last
few feet that my hair turned its colour, so terrible was the suspense
and expectation.

‘But God was very good to me, and I reached the summit with a
couple of feet of line to spare. Dragging the grapnel up, I crouched
down on the little flat, table-like top, and fairly sobbed with pain and
exhaustion.

‘To
259 my alarm, I felt myself growing weaker instead of stronger from

my rest. The fact was that, with the awful cutting about I had
received, I had lost a good deal of blood. Many of the deeper cuts
on my hands and arms were bleeding still. Evidently there was no
time to lose. Standing up, feeling sick and dizzy, I coiled down my
line for a fair throw, and, grasping it some three feet or so above the
grapnel, swung it to and fro until I thought impetus enough was
attained, then hove with all my remaining strength.

‘I shut my eyes, expecting to hear every second the sound of iron

clanging far beneath against the sides of the pinnacle. When I
opened them again, the line was hanging in a slack bight across the
chasm. The little anchor had fallen directly into one of the deep
furrows, but perilously close to the edge. With trembling fingers I
hauled the line in. Tighter, tighter, tighter still, then with all the force
I could command. Would it support the weight of my body, or would
it come?

‘Without staying to argue the question, I made it fast afresh to a

round nob, the only one on the place. Then, saying a short prayer,
and taking a last glance at the blue sky, I let myself slip gently off
the rock, hanging with my hands on the thin, hempen line.
‘It sagged terribly. I could plainly hear my heart knocking and
thumping against my ribs. It sagged and “gave” still more. Imagining
that I heard the noise of the grapnel scraping and dragging, I looked
upon
260 myself as lost. But I still continued to drag myself across. It
was a long, terrible agony, and, more than once, I thought I should
have to let go. My hands almost refused to close upon the rope. But
I still, almost as in a dream, worked myself along. Once I caught
myself wondering if I should fall into or near the boat, and whether
the dead man would be there to receive me. Then a horrible fancy
seized me that I was making no progress, but that my hands were
glued to the rope with blood—ever in the same spot. Then suddenly,
in my now mechanical motions, my head hit with great violence
against rock. This effectually aroused me. I was at the threshold of
liberty—the edge of the crater, where it sloped quickly away below.

‘I hung there whilst one might count twenty, looking up. I was three
feet beneath the rim. The rope had given that much.

‘I don’t remember in the least pulling myself up and over that

overhanging ledge. When my senses returned, I was lying in the
furrow alongside the grapnel, and a rush of cold water was sweeping
under me. How long I had been there I have no notion. Certainly a
great many hours. The rain was pouring down in tropical torrents;
thunder pealed above me, and the lightning flashed and darted in
vain endeavour to pierce the lower abyss.

‘After many fruitless attempts, I staggered to my feet. I felt so

dreadfully weak and faint that I thought I was about to die. But a
glance
261 aloft gave me fresh heart. The dark clouds of the
thunderstorm were passing over, and full upon my nearly naked
body fell the warm rays of the glorious sun. I almost at that
moment, Parsee-like, worshipped him.

‘Painfully, stumbling at every step, I crawled upwards, with many a

rest and draught of the rain water, caught in rocky hollows, until,
after a weary time, and feeling as one risen from the tomb, I
emerged into the full light of day once more.

‘Naked, bleeding, bruised, but free, I stood on the topmost peak of

that fateful island. At first everything swam before my vision. Trees,
the ocean, the far horizon, reeled and shook, advanced and receded
to my dazzled eyes. The sun was low in the heavens. As things
gradually assumed their natural appearance, I became conscious of
a great ship lying at anchor, of a cluster of white tents not a hundred
yards away from me.

‘But of these things, for a space, I took no heed. Sun, air, water and
sky held my regards in ecstasy. I drank the beauty and the newness
of them in till my soul was saturated with the tender loveliness of
that nature to which I had been for so long a stranger. Then, and
not till then, I tottered towards the clump of tents lying just below
me.

‘Men were there, carpenters apparently, hammering at a tall wooden

structure. Other men—men-o’-war seamen by their rig—were
arriving and departing with burdens.

‘I262was close upon them before they saw me. Some shrank back.
One, I recollect, picked up a rifle and brought it to his shoulder. A
man with a gold epaulette on his coat struck it up and spoke to the
sailor in English.

‘Presently I was taken into a tent, a doctor appeared from

somewhere, and, whilst he dressed my wounds, they gave me a
cordial, and I told my story with what seemed to me like the voice of
a stranger. I don’t remember much afterwards until I awoke,
swinging in a hammock under a shady tree close to the tents.

‘I was a mass of bandages, but sensible, though terribly weak.

‘“You’ve had a narrow escape of brain fever, my lad,” said the doctor.
“But we’ve pulled you through all right. Lucky we happened to be
here, though, wasn’t it? A nice time you must have had down there.
We found your rope; but our men didn’t care about venturing any
further, as steam was beginning to come up.”

‘“Four days,” replied the doctor, in answer to my question, “it is since

you appeared on the scene and scared the camp.

‘“The Bucephalus? Yes, curiously enough, we met her just entering

Singapore Harbour. That’s ten days ago. She spoke us, and asked us
to keep a look-out for her boat with two seamen. We have one of
them, at all events. I suppose the other poor beggar will be thrown
up presently.”

‘I263looked at him. “Yes,” he continued, “the old volcano is showing

every indication of renewed activity. We came here to observe the
transit of Venus, but shall have probably to pack up and form
another station if those symptoms don’t subside. See there!”

‘Looking in the direction of his outstretched finger, I saw several tall

puffs of what seemed like white smoke issuing from the depths of
the crater.

‘The observers were loth to shift their quarters; but, when some red-
hot cinders from below set one of the tents on fire, they accepted
the hint.

‘Still in my hammock, I was presently carried down the mountain

and on board H.M.S. Hygeia, where, with careful and skilled
attention, I soon recovered.’

The Captain ceased speaking. For a time nothing was heard except
the steady blast of the ‘Roaring Forties’ overhead.

Asked a passenger presently,—

‘And did the volcano really explode after all?’

‘It did, indeed,’ replied Captain Marion; ‘but not for a month
afterwards, and then so fiercely as to scatter death and destruction
throughout those narrow seas, grinding the island of Krakatoa itself
into cosmic dust—visible, according to scientists, nearly all over the
world.’

. . . . . . . . . .

Here ends the story proper as compiled from the notes taken by one
of the passengers and jotted down in his cabin of a night as the
Captain finished each section of his narrative.

Lower
264 down on the last pages of these notes is gummed, however, a
printed paragraph, cut from a Sydney daily newspaper, which runs
as follows:—

Marion—Hillier.—On the 29th ultimo, at St James’s Church of England, Sydney, by the Rev.
R. Garnsey, George Wreford Marion, master in the British Mercantile Marine, to Amy
Margaret, daughter of the late John Hillier, Esq., of Pevensey, Miller’s Point, Sydney, and
Eurella and Whydah stations, Riverina, N.S.W.
 ‘ D OT ’ S C LA I M .’
265

It was evening in the German Arms at Schwartzdorf. Great fires

blazed in all the rooms of that old-fashioned hostelry, welcome
enough on entering from the chill, wild weather ruling over the
mountainland outside.

Tired with a heavy day’s work at inspecting the mining claims, which
were beginning to attract notice to this secluded spot, it was with a
feeling of satisfaction that, after tea, I drew a chair up to the fire, lit
my pipe, and made myself comfortable.

Presently there was a knock at the door and, in response to my

‘Come in,’ there entered the man who told me this story.

In his hand he carried a canvas bag, whose contents he emptied on

the table with the remark, ‘I thought perhaps you might like to see
these.’

Very beautiful they were, without doubt—quartz, ironstone and gold,

mingled in the most fantastic manner; grotesque attempts by
Nature’s untrained fingers at crosses, hearts, stars, and other shapes
defying name.

‘We
266 got these the last shot knocking off to-night,’ said the owner of

the pretty things as I asked him to sit down. ‘You might remember
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