“Convict Ship, Victory,” he read out to the assemblage.
“Oh, that explains it all,” cried Ned. “I remember reading in a newspaper before we left that the Victory was on her way from Australia to America to be exhibited. They say that she was built in 1790 and was used for many years to bring out convicts from English prisons to Australia, which was at that time a convict settlement. She’s supposed to be just as she was in those days, with whipping posts, irons, and all sorts of instruments of punishment still intact.”
“Cracky! I’d like to see her,” exclaimed Herc, a wish that was echoed by not a few. There was a sort of fascination in gazing at the craft which had been the scene of so much barbarity in the bad old days when she had been known as a floating inferno.
“Look, they’re signaling something!” cried Herc suddenly as a string of bunting went up in the stranger’s peak.
“Short of water,” spelled out a signal-man, who happened to be in the group of interested tars.
“And we’re going to help ’em out, too,” he added soon after, as an answering string of flags went aloft on the Manhattan. “The old man’s signaling the rest of the fleet to heave to while we help them out. Maybe you’ll get a chance to see that old hooker, after all,” he added, turning to the boys.
“If they send away Number One cutter we will,” rejoined Ned, naming the boat to which both of the Dreadnought Boys were assigned and in which he pulled stroke oar.
Presently a bos’un’s mate came roaring along the deck.
“Away, Number One cutter! Do you hear!”
“Aye! aye!” cried the sailors assigned to that boat, and headed by Ned and Herc they hastened to the boat deck, where they found a young ensign in command. The boat was swiftly lowered and several casks of water placed on board.