“Yes, sir.”

“Not till you got ’em. Wish I had!”

“I dare say you do, sir. Now, then: how did they come there?”

“Why, your chaps put ’em there. I see ’em just now.”

“No, no; I mean in the sea and on that rock.”

“Come there?” said Ram, with a vacant look.

“Yes, sir! How did they come there? Now, no trifling; out with it at once.”

“Been a wreck, p’r’aps, and they’re washed up.”

“Bah!” cried the lieutenant.

“Ah, you may say ‘Bah!’ but they might. Why, there was a big ship’s boat and a jib-boom washed up here one day; warn’t there, Jem?”