I took him in hand, though he was as venomous as a young snake, and after a couple of months I got him all right and able to walk.

He took a kind of fancy to me then, and would hardly go back to his woods, but was always hanging about my hut.
I learned a little of his lingo from him, and this made him all the fonder of me.
"Tonga--for that was his name--was a fine boatman, and owned a big, roomy canoe of his own.

When I found that he was devoted to me and would do anything to serve me, I saw my chance of escape.

I talked it over with him.

He was to bring his boat round on a certain night to an old wharf which was never guarded, and there he was to pick me up.