“My opinion is,” said Arthur, “that the ship’s been dragging her anchor, and has been drifting all these five days; or, at any rate, ever since the wind rose.”
“Perhaps she has broken loose,” said Tom. “The chain may have had a weak link. I remember the anchor went down with a tremendous jerk.”
“For my part,” said Phil, “I’m half inclined to believe that the anchor never got to the bottom. I don’t know how deep the water is in the middle of the Gulf of St. Lawrence, but I remember thinking at the time that it was a very short chain to reach to the bottom of the sea. I remember wondering that the gulf was so shallow, but I thought that Captain Corbet knew what he was about; but now, the more I think of it, the more sure I feel that Captain Corbet did not know what he was about, but dropped anchor, and let things slide, after his usual careless fashion. He confessed, over and over, that he knew nothing at all about these waters; and he never once took the trouble to sound, or to try and hunt up a chart. No; he has dropped anchor, and the anchor has never begun to get near the bottom. The consequence is, we’ve been drifting along ever since he left us, and are now ever so many miles away from the place where the anchor was dropped. And, what’s worse, I dare say the Antelope was back there two days ago; but we were gone, and so, of course, Captain Corbet’s lost us, and has no more idea where to look for us than a child.”
Phil’s theory was so plausible, that it was at once accepted by all the boys. It seemed the most natural way of accounting for everything,—for the absence of the Antelope, and the appearance of this strange shore. For a time a deep gloom fell over all, and they stood in silence, staring at the land.
Out of this gloom Tom was the first to rouse himself.
“I tell you what it is, boys,” said he, at length, “I don’t know that it’s so bad a thing after all. The more I think of it, the better it seems. I’d ten times sooner be near some land, as we are now, than be far away out in the midst of the sea, with nothing to be seen, day after day, but sky and water. It seems to me that we must be drawing nearer to the land, and before evening we may be close enough to see what sort of a country it is. If the worst comes to the worst, we can launch the boat, and go ashore. It’s a little rough, but, after all, not too rough for the boat. I’ve been out in an open boat when the water was quite as rough as this. It seems rough to us, because the ship is water-logged, and is drifting every way—end on, side on, and so forth.”
“I wonder what land it is,” said Phil.
“If we only knew how the wind has been, we might guess how we have been drifting,” said Bruce; “but the wind has changed once or twice, and I’ve never kept any account of it.”
“Sometimes,” said Bart, “it has been blowing from the bows, and sometimes from the quarter.”
“O, of course, and every other way,” said Arthur; “for the simple reason that the ship must have been turning about, first one way and then the other, as she drifted.”