“Yes, you do, and very clever questions for a boy of your age; and I only wish that I could answer them better than I can sometimes.”
“I should like to go down now, my dear,” said Mrs Seagrave; “perhaps Ready will see the baby down safe.”
“That I will, ma’am,” said Ready, putting his quadrant on the capstan: “now, Juno, give me the child, and go down first;—backwards, you stupid girl! how often do I tell you that? Some day or another you will come down with a run.”
“And break my head,” said Juno.
“Yes, or break your arm; and then who is to hold the child?”
As soon as they were all down in the cabin, the captain and Mr Seagrave marked the position of the vessel on the chart, and found that they were one hundred and thirty miles from the Cape of Good Hope.
“If the wind holds, we shall be in to-morrow,” said Mr Seagrave to his wife. “Juno, perhaps you may see your father and mother.”
Poor Juno shook her head, and a tear or two stole down her dark cheek. With a mournful face she told them, that her father and mother belonged to a Dutch boer, who had gone with them many miles into the interior: she had been parted from them when quite a little child, and had been left at Cape Town.