It was then half-past four.  In order to prepare for dinner it was necessary that the settlers should return to their dwelling.  The little band retraced their steps, therefore, and by the left bank of the Mercy, Cyrus Harding and his companions arrived at the Chimneys.

The fire was lighted, and Neb and Pencroft, on whom the functions of cooks naturally devolved, to the one in his quality of Negro, to the other in that of sailor, quickly prepared some broiled agouti, to which they did great justice.

The repast at length terminated; at the moment when each one was about to give himself up to sleep, Cyrus Harding drew from his pocket little specimens of different sorts of minerals, and just said,—­

“My friends, this is iron mineral, this a pyrite, this is clay, this is lime, and this is coal.  Nature gives us these things.  It is our business to make a right use of them.  To-morrow we will commence operations.”

Chapter 13

“Well, captain, where are we going to begin?” asked Pencroft next morning of the engineer.

“At the beginning,” replied Cyrus Harding.

And in fact, the settlers were compelled to begin “at the very beginning.”  They did not possess even the tools necessary for making tools, and they were not even in the condition of nature, who, “having time, husbands her strength.”  They had no time, since they had to provide for the immediate wants of their existence, and though, profiting by acquired experience, they had nothing to invent, still they had everything to make; their iron and their steel were as yet only in the state of minerals, their earthenware in the state of clay, their linen and their clothes in the state of textile material.

It must be said, however, that the settlers were “men” in the complete and higher sense of the word.  The engineer Harding could not have been seconded by more intelligent companions, nor with more devotion and zeal.  He had tried them.  He knew their abilities.

Gideon Spilett, a talented reporter, having learned everything so as to be able to speak of everything, would contribute largely with his head and hands to the colonization of the island.  He would not draw back from any task:  a determined sportsman, he would make a business of what till then had only been a pleasure to him.

Herbert, a gallant boy, already remarkably well informed in the natural sciences, would render greater service to the common cause.

Neb was devotion personified.  Clever, intelligent, indefatigable, robust, with iron health, he knew a little about the work of the forge, and could not fail to be very useful in the colony.

As to Pencroft, he had sailed over every sea, a carpenter in the dockyards in Brooklyn, assistant tailor in the vessels of the state, gardener, cultivator, during his holidays, etc., and like all seamen, fit for anything, he knew how to do everything.