CHAPTER XXII.
THE RENDEZVOUS--AN EPISODE--PECULIAR CIRCUMSTANCES--OTHER MATTERS.
About five or six days' sail from the scene of our tale there lies one of those small rocks or islets with which the breast of the Pacific is in many places thickly studded.
It is a lonely coral isle, far removed from any of its fellows, and presenting none of those grand features which characterize the island on which the settlement of Sandy Cove was situated.

In no part does it rise more than thirty feet above the level of the sea; in most places it is little more than a few feet above it.

The coral reefs around it are numerous; and as many of them rise to within a few feet of the surface, the navigation in its neighborhood is dangerous in the extreme.
At the time of which we write, the vegetation of the isle was not very luxuriant.

Only a few clusters of cocoanut palms grew here and there over its otherwise barren surface.

In this respect it did not resemble most of the other islands of the Pacific.