The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1913-09-03
Copyright, IoT2, by confirmed. VT

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 CHAPTER M.
 How We Landed on the Wondrous
 Shore.
 A LTHOUGH our progress in the EA water laden boat was slow, it "A didn't take us long to reach
 the shore, which was there nothing more than a strip of sand perhaps a hundred yards across at the widest part. It was as bare of any thing as the palm of my hand. l hauled the boat up on 1t after we had disembarked and hastened to dis charge its precious cargo. The inval uable powder and shot had been kept in cans and f1asks in air tight lockers forward and aft and were undamaged. The rest of her Iading had been in the water too short a time to be much hurt It was all water soaked, of course, but an hours exposure in the warm sun on the dry sand would make 1t as good as new. Spreading all out to dry pulled the plug from the boat. drained the water from her and haul ed her up we'll on to the sand
 A hasty glance assured me that the cliff was of coral formation, jagged and broken with many a crevice and cranny. After we had made every thing shipshape I suggested to Mis- uess Lucy that we start at once ex- ploring- I proposed that we follow the course of the sandy strip and see if there was not some break in the cliffs whereby we could get to the top and learn what was within the wall. And so refreshing ourselves and taking with us some provisions, for we might have to go clear around the island, we pres entIy started out
 felt very easy in my mind regarding any present peril from the ship, for I knew that no boat she possessed could run the reef as had done, and even if she had had another like the dinghy was confident that there was no man aboard her that had the strength and skill, to say nothing of the courage, to bring her through. If there were no natives or wild beasts to be feared we were at least safe for the time being
 Think you, Master Hampdon,' said my little mistress, ''this is the island of which my ancestor wrote ?''
 -'I am sure of it. replied.
 He referred to it, if I remember right, as the island of the Stairs,' did he not?'
 ''Yes." was my answer. ''You remem- Der he indicated a stairway about the middle of the isIand.''
 Surely, if we are to get to the top of wonder wall it must be by stairs of some sort.''
 Tt would not be difficult to climb it,'' I assented, flor a man, that is, save for one thing"
 And what is that?''
 These pinnacles of rock are as sharp as needles It would be like climbing broken glass. The climber would be cut to pieces before he had gone half way
 Then 5f we find no stairs we are in a bad fix she said thoughtfully, ex- amining the@towering wall.
 'sThere must be stairs,'' I answered. ''There must be way. The latitude and longitude agree with your ances- tors description and make no doubt we shall chance upon them.'
 So we tramped along, searching the shore and sea and finding nothing. After perhaps an hours monotonous going, when we had traversed about a third of the distance of the island, we rounded a projection of the cliff and there before us rose the stairs!
 What we saw was a gigantic stair way, irregular, but made of huge blocks of rough hewn stone, not coral rock, but harder stone of firLner tex ture, like granite almost. I was not familiar with the stone either. There was no symmetry about it, some of the stones rose perhaps three feet and oth- CTS not more than as many inches, but stairs they certainly were and they surely had been made by man, and the Ssoaes were most carefully fitted. be- ing laid up without mortar, the sur faces so close that could scarce thrust a knife blade between. The huge blocks were of monstrous size, too, much too great in bulk and weight to be handled by any primitive mechani- cal means. I thought I never could conceive how natives or primitive men could have shaped them, moved them and finally laid them up in the form of stairs. 'i --~ s-''@-' N s~ Nor did the stairs alone awaken our amazement and quicken our curiosity. They ended in a circHng belt of sand, here a little wider than elsewhere. At the bottom on either side, two gigan- tic statuessoF busts of stone had been erected Their Bases were buried in the sand, and they rose to quite twice my height above and I am good six feet and more tall. These stones were carved into the rough yet not unreal ukenesses of human faces.
 Why we had not discovered these sfairs from seaward was because they