With the moan of a rising gale in their ears, the members of the expedition soon dropped off to sleep.
IV.
THE WRECK OF THE ROCHEFORT.
AT dawn the Purser arose and woke the camp with the blood-curdling cry, "The Rochefort is gone!" The rest, as soon as they could rub their eyes open, scanned the lake to leeward, but no trace of the missing canoe could be seen. The sky was grey with low driving clouds and the lake repeated the sombre hue, save when it broke into white before the southerly gale.
With ill concealed reluctance the Commodore offered to lend his darling Becky to the bereaved Statesman, who protested that the loss of an election was as nothing in comparison with his present affliction. It must be admitted, too, that his remarks as to going in a Red Laker to the rescue of a Chrysalid, were not altogether gracious. However, the Purser volunteered to go with him in search of the runaway, each man following one side of the lake which was here only about two miles wide. Under the shortest possible sail, then, they set out, each standing across the wind at first, so as to close in with the shore and then follow it down with the wind astern. They went merrily off riding the white caps like ducks, and turning to follow the dark wooded shores to the North.
Presently the Purser was observed to broach to, and after a short time he went ashore, unshipped his mast and proceeded under paddle. It subsequently transpired that the sea wrenched off one of the "gudgeons" which held the rudder, and he was thereupon disabled for sailing purposes. The wind, however, was dead astern, and he progressed almost as easily and as fast as if he had not lost his helm.
"His Ship she was a-wrack."