“I wonder what time it is?” said one.
Tom had a watch, but he had forgotten to wind it up for two or three nights, and it had stopped at eight o’clock. The boys were quite sure, however, that they could not have been asleep more than half an hour.
“It’s about one o’clock,” said Harry, presently.
“I don’t believe it’s more than nine,” said Joe.
“We must have gone into the tent about an hour after sunset,” continued Harry, “and the sun sets between six and seven. It was low-tide then, and it’s pretty near high-tide now; and since the tide runs up for about six hours, it must be somewhere between twelve and one.”
“You’re right,” exclaimed Jim. “Look at the stars. That bright star over there in the west was just rising when we went to bed.”
“You ought to say ‘turned in!’” said Joe. “Sailors never go to bed; they always ‘turn in.’”
“Well, we can’t turn in any more to-night,” replied Tom. “What do you say, boys? suppose we have breakfast—it’ll pass away the time, and we can have another breakfast by-and-by.”
Now that the boys thought of it, they began to feel hungry, for they had had a very light supper. Everybody felt that hot coffee would be very nice; so they all went to work—made coffee, fried a piece of ham, and, with a few slices of bread, made a capital breakfast. They wrung out the wet blankets and clothes, and hung them up by the fire to dry. Then they had to collect more firewood; and gradually the faint light of the dawn became visible, before they really had time to find the task of waiting for daylight tiresome.
They decided that it would not do to start with wet blankets, since they could not dry them in the boat. They therefore continued to keep up a brisk fire, and to watch the blankets closely, in order to see that they did not get scorched. After a time the sun came out bright and hot, and took the drying business in charge. The boys went into the river, and had a nice long swim, and then spent some time in carefully packing everything into the boat. By the time the blankets were dry, and they were ready to start, the tide had fallen so low that the boat was high and dry; and in spite of all their efforts they could not launch her while she was loaded.