But the wave rose up maliciously, foot by foot, till it drowned their cries for ever in the storm.

The sand-bank was called "Ecriviere," and the rock was afterwards known as the "Pierre des Femmes." Other rocks less prominent, but no less treacherous, flanked it--the Noir Sabloniere and the Grande Galere.

To the right of the main island were a group of others, all reef and shingle, intersected by treacherous channels; in calm lapped by water with the colours of a prism of crystal, in storm by a leaden surf and flying foam.

These were known as the Colombiere, the Grosse Tete, Tas de Pois, and the Marmotiers; each with its retinue of sunken reefs and needles of granitic gneiss lying low in menace.

Happy the sailor caught in a storm and making for the shelter the little curves in the island afford, who escapes a twist of the current, a sweep of the tide, and the impaling fingers of the submarine palisades.
Beyond these rocks lay Maitre Ile, all gneiss and shingle, a desert in the sea.