The grown-up slaves, of course, could not leave the plantation; but there were numbers of fleet-footed lads who, after nightfall, could be dispatched from the huts into the mountains, and return before daylight; while, even should they remain until the next night, they would attract no attention by their absence.
Thus, then, Ned and Gerald learned that a formidable body of Spaniards were being collected, quietly, in the town; and every effort was made to meet the coming storm.

The various gorges were blocked with high barricades; difficult parts of the mountain were, with great labor, scarped so as to render the advance of an armed force difficult in the extreme; great piles of stones were collected, to roll down into the ravines; and provisions of yams, sweet potatoes, and other food were stored up.
The last stronghold had, after a great debate, been fixed upon at a point in the heart of one of the hills.

This was singularly well adapted for defense The hill itself was extremely precipitous on all sides.

On one side, it fell sheer down.

A goat track ran along the face of this precipice, to a point where the hill fell back, forming a sort of semicircular arena on the very face of the precipice.