Walking here was not at all difficult, and he went on without any interruption, until, at last, he found any farther progress barred by a precipice.  He was at the lower or western end of the island.

He looked down, and found beneath him a great precipice, while rocks jutted out from the sea, and ledges projected beyond.  The gulls were present here, as elsewhere, in great flocks, and still kept up their noisy screams.

Tom looked out over the sea, and saw its waters spread far away till it was lost in the horizon.  On the line of that horizon he saw a faint gray cloud, that looked like a fog bank.  It had, to his eyes, a certain gloomy menace, and seemed to say to him that he had not seen the last of it yet.  On the left of the broad sea, the Nova Scotia Coast ran along till it was lost in the distance; and on the right was the long line of the New Brunswick shore, both of which had now that dark hue of olive green which he had noticed on the land opposite before he had started.

Suddenly, while he was looking, his eyes caught sight of something white that glistened brightly from the blue water.  It was about midway between the two coasts, and he knew it at once to be some sailing vessel.  He could not make out more than one sail, and that showed that the vessel was either coming up the bay or going down; for if it had been crossing, she would, of course, have lain broadside on to his present locality, and would have thus displayed two sails to his view.  The sight of this vessel agitated him exceedingly; and the question about her probable course now entered his mind, and drove away all other thoughts.  Whether that vessel were going up or down became of exclusive importance to him now, if she were coming up, she might approach him, and hear his hail, or catch sight of his signals.  Suddenly he reflected that he had no way of attracting attention, and a wild desire of running back and setting up the longest pole or board that he could find came into his mind; but such was the intensity of his curiosity, and the weight of his suspense, that he could not move from the spot where he was until he had satisfied himself as to the vessel’s course.

He sat down not far from the edge of the precipice, and, leaning forward with his hands supporting his chin, he strained his eyes over the intervening distance, as he tried to make out in which way the vessel was going.  It seemed fully ten miles away, and her hull was not visible.  It was only the white of her sails that he saw; and as the sunlight played on these from time to time, or fell off from the angle of reflection, the vessel was alternately more or less visible, and thus seemed by turns to draw nearer and depart farther from his sight.