Adrift in the Wilds; Or, The Adventures of Two Shipwrecked Boys

by Edward Sylvester Ellis

The efforts of a child, if steadily persevered in, would move the Great Eastern in calm water, and Tim was not long in making the discovery that, if he could not use the paddle, he still was able to exert a motive power upon the canoe by a very slight means.

Reaching his hand over the side, he began paddling the water, and soon had the gratifying consciousness that he was moving across the river. True, it was slow, but it was nevertheless certain and positive, and was carrying him further away from his troublesome pursuers, and must eventually bring him against the western shore.

But when the island disappeared from view, and he had barely crossed the center of the stream, he begun to think that this species of locomotion was rather tardy, and he partially came to the sitting position and ventured to take his paddle in hand. A discharge from the shore warned him of the danger he ran, and he was reluctantly forced to drop his head again and resort to his tedious method of moving.

By this time the afternoon was well advanced, and it looked as though it would be fully dark before Tim could regain the ground he had lost. Now and then he peered over the top of the deer to see whether he could possibly catch sight of his acquaintances, but they whisked from cover to cover so dexterously that he had not the encouragement even to hope for success, and so he did not fire.

But a new fear took possession of the fugitive. If they were Indians, it was to be expected that they had canoes somewhere, and if they were speedily found, he would as speedily be overhauled.

"In which case Tim O'Rooney will lose his daar, and be the same towken lose himself, and the boys won't get their dinner."

He squinted at the sun, now low in the sky, and quickly asked himself:

"If a man doesn't git his dinner, and ates half-way atween noon and midnight, is it his dinner or supper? But that is a mighty question, is the same."

He evidently concluded it was too vast for him to decide, for he speedily dismissed it and turned his attention to that which more nearly concerned him. Still toiling with his hand, much in the same manner that a child would dabble in the water, he kept up the tardy movement of the canoe until he began to grow fearless again, and he took his paddle once more.

Now, when it was almost too late, he found that he could use it without danger to himself. By bending his body forward, the deer protected him and he could labor with impunity.