“We have been looking for a wreck at sea or on land!”
“Well?”
“Well; and here we’ve found one in the air!”
And the sailor pointed to a great white rag, caught in the top of the pine, a fallen scrap of which the dog had brought to them.
“But that is not a wreck!” cried Gideon Spilett.
“I beg your pardon!” returned Pencroft.
“Why? is it—?”
“It is all that remains of our airy boat, of our balloon, which has been caught up aloft there, at the top of that tree!”
Pencroft was not mistaken, and he gave vent to his feelings in a tremendous hurrah, adding,—
“There is good cloth! There is what will furnish us with linen for years. There is what will make us handkerchiefs and shirts! Ha, ha, Mr. Spilett, what do you say to an island where shirts grow on the trees?”