“How would you like to give up, for the present, your bandit camp, take away all your provision, haul down your flag, and go away?”
“What, sir!” cried the boys in consternation, and a cloud of gloom passed over their-faces.
“How would you like me to charter a little schooner, fill it with provisions, turn the hold into a sleeping-place, and start off for a week’s cruise around the Basin of Minas, going ashore at the Five Islands, at Parrsboro’, at Blomidon, and at any other, place where we might wish? What do you say to that? Ah, ha!” cried the doctor, as he watched the changing faces of the boys, where the gloom had vanished instantly, and given place to the wildest delight. “Ah, ha! that suits you—does it! Well, that’s what I’ve come to propose.”
“O, Dr. Porter! Are you really in earnest? Do you mean it?—a schooner—a schooner?—a cruise round Minas Basin? O, good! good! good! Hurrah! Three cheers!”
A hundred incoherent shouts and words like these burst from the boys as they dashed about in wild and frantic delight, overwhelmed with joy at this proposal to all of them. It seemed a thing so glorious that nothing of which the mind could conceive was to be compared with it. A cruise round Minas Basin! What did not that involve? Adventures of a hundred kinds; drifting about in wild tides; getting lost in dense fogs; running ashore on wide mud flats, or on precipitous cliffs, or on the edge of perilous breakers; landing on lonely headlands, or on solitary islands; penetrating far forests; camping out in wildernesses; living pirate fashion in their own schooner, where all would be given up to them; shooting, fishing; hunting for gulls’ nests;—it meant not sham adventures, but real ones—with real dangers environing them instead of fancied ones. They could cease playing at Robbers, and play what to them seemed the nobler part of Pirates; the skull-and-cross-bones flag could adorn the schooner, and the fog-trumpet could sound forth amid the echoing cliffs of Blomidon. It meant anything and everything, and far more than even their vivid fancies could very well portray. To most boys the sea always promises more adventure than the land; there is always something of the joy of discovery in every new voyage, and so all these boys felt now; but to Bart, most of all, was the prospect most delightful; for he had already known to the full that longing for the sea which many boys have, and that which his father had prevented him from realizing, now seemed to come to him. In some respects this seemed to be better than the voyage which he had formerly dreamed of; for though it would not be long, yet it would be varied and eventful, and not free from danger. Best of all, it would be made in company with the other boys.
It was some time before the boys were able, in their excitement, to get any clear idea of what Dr. Porter was telling them. At length they learned that Mr. Simmons and Mr. Long wished to visit Blomidon and the Five Islands in search after minerals, with which the cliffs are filled. They had concluded to get a schooner, and take the larger boys with them. They expected to spend about a week, and take provisions sufficient for that time. Dr. Porter would not be able to go himself, but would intrust the boys to the care and the jurisdiction of Messrs. Simmons and Long. Such was the plan.
Moreover, the schooner was already engaged. It was the Antelope, Captain Corbet; and it was proposed to leave, if possible, that very afternoon, so as to be on the other side of the bay, or at least near Blomidon, by sundown. As it was then ten o’clock, there was no time to lose, but everything should be prepared at once, and taken on board the schooner. One thing only was insisted on by Dr. Porter; and that was, that they should take no firearms. Bart pleaded so hard for his little pistol, however, that the doctor let him keep it, and satisfied himself by making them leave the gun behind.