Captain Hull's act of humanity, however, would not be complete unless he succeeded in restoring the shipwrecked men to their homes. This he promised to do. After completing the unlading at Valparaiso, the "Pilgrim" would make direct for California, where, as Mrs. Weldon assured them, they would be most hospitably received by her husband, and provided with the necessary means for returning to Pennsylvania.
The five men, who, as the consequence of the shipwreck, had lost all the savings of their last three years of toil, were profoundly grateful to their kind-hearted benefactors; nor, poor negroes as they were, did they utterly resign the hope that at some future time they might have it in their power to repay the debt which they owed their deliverers.
[Illustration: The good natured negroes were ever ready to lend a helping hand.]
CHAPTER V.
DINGO'S SAGACITY.
Meantime the "Pilgrim" pursued her course, keeping as much as possible to the east, and before evening closed in the hull of the "Waldeck" was out of sight.
Captain Hull still continued to feel uneasy about the constant prevalence of calms; not that for himself he cared much about the delay of a week or two in a voyage from New Zealand to Valparaiso, but he was disappointed at the prolonged inconvenience it caused to his lady passenger. Mrs. Weldon, however, submitted to the detention very philosophically, and did not utter a word of complaint.
The captain's next care was to improvise sleeping accommodation for Tom and his four associates. No room for them could possibly be found in the crew's quarters, so that their berths had to be arranged under the forecastle; and as long as the weather continued fine, there was no reason why the negroes, accustomed as they were to a somewhat rough life, should not find themselves sufficiently comfortable.
After this incident of the discovery of the wreck, life on board the "Pilgrim" relapsed into its ordinary routine. With the wind invariably in the same direction, the sails required very little shifting; but whenever it happened, as occasionally it would, that there was any tacking to be done, the good-natured negroes were ever ready to lend a helping hand; and the rigging would creak again under the weight of Hercules, a great strapping fellow, six feet high, who seemed almost to require ropes of extra strength made for his special use.