“Is there none in any of the other casks?” he asked.
Owen knew that they had been emptied to the last drop. He crawled to where they were stowed, and tried one after the other. They were perfectly dry. Without water to moisten their lips, no one would be able to masticate the last remnants of food.
“I knew it would be so,” groaned the mate. “Any sign of a breeze?”
“None that I can perceive, sir,” answered Owen. He dragged himself up by the mast so as to obtain a wider range of observation. Unable to stand long he soon sat down again. After a lapse of some time the mate again asked in a faint voice, “Any sign of a breeze?”
Owen once more looked out. He was about to sink down on the thwart, when his eye fell on a white spot in the horizon. He gazed at it without speaking; it might be only a sea-bird’s wing. Again and again he looked with straining eyes.
“A sail! a sail!” he exclaimed. His voice sounded hollow and strange; he fancied some one else was speaking.
“Are you mocking us?” asked the mate.
“No, sir, I am certain it is a sail,” answered Owen.
His voice aroused Nat and Mike, who turned round and looked over the side. The mate, who just before appeared to have entirely lost his strength, dragged himself up and took Owen’s place at the mast.
With what sounded like an hysterical laugh, “Yes,” he cried out, “a sail! no doubt about it; she is bringing up a breeze, and standing this way. We are saved! we are saved!”