A howl of derision cut him short.
With hearty thanks to the captain for his courtesy, six boys presently dashed up the companionway to the deck, while Dave, his eyes twinkling, slowly followed. He wandered off by himself, and some time later they found him, stretched flat on his back between the life-boats, contemplating a blue and white sky with infinite contentment.
"Oh, can't you chaps let me alone?" he drawled, when Jack, with a yell of glee, disturbed his rest.
But, in spite of entreaties, they cruelly pounced upon their victim and dragged him protestingly away.
"It would serve Dave just right if we wedged him fast between the lumber and this what-you-may-call-'em at the side, and left him to his fate," pronounced Sam severely.
"Dreadful pirates!" sighed Dave.
Bob's field-glass was thrust into the stout boy's hand, as they hustled him to the bow.
"If you don't say that's one of the bulliest sights you ever saw, something will happen," said Bob. He waved his arm toward a range of the Cascade Mountains.
The highest, a snow-capped peak, pierced a veil of whitish cloud, shone against a patch of deep blue sky, and was lost in a mass of vapor above.
Dave gave a cry of admiration, as he swept the field-glass across their rugged slopes. Successively framed within that little circle of light were enchanting views of wild mountain scenery—dense forests, tinged yellow and brown, in many places interspersed with the rich green of hemlock and pine; deeply shadowed ravines; great piles of barren rock, crowned by tangled vegetation and trees whose branches sometimes hung far over dizzy depths. Then flashed into view a foaming cascade, tumbling from one level to another like a silver streak.