“Very well,” said Williams at length, as though he had finally settled some knotty point to his complete satisfaction. “Now then, Ned, where are we?”
Ned placed his finger on a blank part of the chart and answered, “Just there.”
“Yes,” agreed Rogers, profoundly, “that’s the very identical spot.”
Williams glanced at Rogers with a broad smile of amusement, fully aware that the latter understood a chart about as well as he understood Sanscrit, and then turned to Ned with the remark:
“Now the next place we want, Ned, is a good harbour where the ship can ride it out safely in all weathers, where we can heave her down, if need be, to clear the weeds and barnacles off her bottom, and where we can build stores and what not.”
“Ah!” remarked Ned. “That is a place which has yet to be found.”
“Yes, of course, we know that,” assented Williams sharply. “The question is, where ought we to look for it? Of course you understand it must be a place quite out of the regular track of ships, and not likely to be visited.”
“In that case,” said Ned, “I know of no better place to search than our present neighbourhood. You see that the sea all round the spot where we now are is marked ‘Unknown,’ which means, of course, that very few ships navigate these waters, and I fancy that such can scarcely be said of many other parts of the ocean except such as lie pretty close to the North and South Poles.”
“Very well,” said Williams, “in this matter we must trust to you, and we will therefore search this ‘unknown’ part of the sea. You know best how it should be done, so give your orders, and I will see that they are carried out.”
“In that case,” said Ned, “my advice is this. The wind is still westerly, and a favourable opportunity is therefore afforded for the prosecution of our search to the eastward. Now, from our main-royal-yard a man can see very nearly twenty miles—far enough, at all events, to make out any land at that distance suitable for your purpose. I would propose, then, that we should work a traverse to the eastward, sailing, say, one hundred miles on north by east a half east course, and then wearing round and sailing two hundred miles on a south by east a half east course. This will enable us to examine a strip of sea two hundred miles wide, whilst our northerly and southerly tracks will never be so far apart but what we must sight any land which happens to lie within that two-hundred-mile-wide belt. I would continue the search for say two hundred or two hundred and fifty miles to the eastward; and then, if you fail to find what you want, we must return and begin a systematic search to the westward, unless indeed you feel inclined to take the risk of venturing into better known waters. At night I would heave the ship to, with her canvas so balanced that she will make no headway; and in this way, I think, we may manage to pretty thoroughly explore the proposed track.”