“I hope you don't set down the loss of Captain Williams among our luck, sir!”
“Not I, but the stuff is all logged together, you know; and, in overhauling for one idee, in such a mess, a fellow is apt to get hold of another. As I was saying, we have been amazingly lucky, and I expect nothing else but we shall discover an island yet!”
“Can that be of any great service to us? There are so many owners ready to start up and claim such discoveries, that I question if it would do us any great benefit.”
“Let them start up—who cares for them; we'll have the christening, and that's half the battle. Marble Land, Wallingford Bay, Talcott Hills, and Cape Crisis, would look well on a chart—ha! Miles?”
“I have no objection to see it, sir.”
“Land ho!” cried the look-out on the forecastle.
“There it is now, by George!” cried Marble, springing forward—“I overhauled the chart half an hour since, and there ought to be nothing within six hundred miles of us.”
There it was, sure enough, and much nearer to us than was at all desirable. So near, indeed, that the wash of the breakers on the reef that so generally lies off from the low coral islands of the Pacific, was distinctly audible from the ship. The moon gave a strong light, it is true, and the night was soft and balmy; but the air, which was very light, blew directly towards this reef, and then there were always currents to apprehend. We sounded, but got no bottom.
“Ay, this is one of your coral reefs, where a man goes on the rocks from off soundings, at a single jump,” muttered Marble, ordering the ship brought by the wind on the best tack to haul off shore. “No notice, and a wreck. As for anchoring in such a place, a fellow might as well run a line out to Japan; and, could an anchor find the bottom, the cable would have some such berth as a man who slept in a hammock filled with open razors.”
All this was true enough; and we watched the effect of our change of course with the greatest anxiety. All hands were called, and the men were stationed, in readiness to work the ship. But, a few minutes satisfied us, the hope of clawing off, in so light an air, was to the last degree vain. The vessel set in fast towards the reef, the breakers on which now became apparent, even by the light of the moon; the certain sign they were fearfully near.