Explore "The Coral Island" by R.M. Ballantyne on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
I fall into the hands of pirates -- How they treated me, and what I said to them -- The result of the whole ending in a melancholy separation and in a most unexpected gift.
My heart seemed to leap into my throat at the words; and, turning round, I beheld a man of immense stature, and fierce aspect regarding me with a smile of contempt. He was a white man -- that is to say, he was a man of European blood, though his face, from long exposure to the weather, was deeply bronzed. His dress was that of a common seaman, except that he had on a Greek skullcap, and wore a broad shawl of the richest silk round his waist. In this shawl were placed two pair of pistols and a heavy cutlass. He wore a beard and moustache, which, like the locks on his head, were short, curly, and sprinkled with gray hairs.