we had tried to reach the Guacharo cave.  Inside that notch in the cliffs must be the wooded bay, whence we picked up the shells among the fallen leaves and flowers.  From under that dark wall beyond it the Guacharos must be just trooping out for their nightly forage, as they had trooped out since—­He alone who made them knows how long.  The outline of Huevos, the outline of Monos, were growing lower and grayer astern.  A long ragged haze, far loftier than that on the starboard quarter, signified the Northern Mountains; and far off on the port quarter lay a flat bank of cloud, amid which rose, or seemed to rise, the Cordillera of the Main, and the hills where jaguars lie.  Canopus blazed high astern, and Fomalhaut below him to the west, as if bidding us a kind farewell.  Orion and Aldebaran spangled the zenith.  The young moon lay on her back in the far west, thin and pale, over Cumana and the Cordillera, with Venus, ragged and red with earth mist, just beneath.  And low ahead, with the pointers horizontal, glimmered the cold pole-star, for which we were steering, out of the summer into the winter once more.  We grew chill as we looked at him; and shuddered, it may be, cowered for a moment, at the thought of ‘Niflheim,’ the home of frosts and fogs, towards which we were bound.

However, we were not yet out of the Tropics.  We had still nearly a fortnight before us in which to feel sure there was a sun in heaven; a fortnight more of the ‘warm champagne’ atmosphere which was giving fresh life and health to us both.  And up the islands we went, wiser, but not sadder, than when we went down them; casting wistful eyes, though, to windward, for there away—­and scarcely out of sight—­lay Tobago, to which we had a most kind invitation; and gladly would we have looked at that beautiful and fertile little spot, and have pictured to ourselves Robinson Crusoe and Man Friday pacing along the coral beach in one of its little southern coves.  More wistfully still did we look to windward when we thought of Barbadoes, and of the kind people who were ready to welcome us into that prosperous and civilised little cane-garden, which deserves—­ and has deserved for now two hundred years, far more than poor old Ireland—­the name of ‘The Emerald Gem of the Western World.’

But it could not be.  A few hours at Grenada, and a few hours at St. Lucia, were all the stoppages possible to us.  The steamer only passes once a fortnight, and it is necessary to spend that time on each island which is visited, unless the traveller commits himself—­ which he cannot well do if he has a lady with him—­to the chances and changes of coasting schooners.  More frequent and easy intercommunication is needed throughout the Antilles.  The good people, whether white or coloured, need to see more of each other, and more of visitors from home.  Whether a small weekly steamer between the islands would pay in money, I know not.  That it would pay morally and socially, I am sure.  Perhaps, when the telegraph is laid down along the islands, the need of more steamers will be felt and supplied.