Bartlett and the little boy jumped into the boat; and the other man first pushed the boat deeper into the sea, going into the water himself, and then climbed into the boat; and Bartlett and his boy, each with an oar, rowed a little till they were away from the shore, and the boat tossed up and down, and Alice and Beatrice came close to grandmamma and looked afraid.
Grandmamma then took Beatrice on her lap, and said—
‘A boat always rocks up and down at first; as soon as the sails are up, it will be much quieter.’
So they did not cry; but Beatrice said, ‘I should like to go back best.’
‘May we go back?’ asked Alice.
‘No, dear children, you must wait a little, and then I think that you will like the boat very much. Look at little Jack Bartlett, how he helps his father to unroll the sail and to pull the ropes.’
The children looked, and saw the sailor and his boy unroll a large piece of cloth; they knew that it was a sail, and they saw the men pull it up a high pole, which Alice told her sister was called a mast. The sail was red, and had a little hole in it. The wind blew upon the sail and made it straight; then the two men put up another sail, and little Jack came to sit near grandmamma, at her end of the boat.
There was so much to look at, that the children soon forgot their fear, and Alice asked—
‘What is Jack doing at our end of the boat?’
‘He is steering, miss,’ said Bartlett.