The largest hole was, I saw, in the very centre of a bunk, so that we could easily get at it. Dragging out all the blankets from the other bunks, I rammed them into the hole.
“Hand me a board or the top of a chest—knock it off quick!” I sang out.
Jim, leaping on a chest, wrenched off the lid and gave it me.
“Now that handspike.”
There was one close to him. By pressing the board against the blankets, and jamming the handspike down between it and the outer corner of the bunk, the gush of water was stopped.
“Here’s another hole still more forward, I can see the water bubbling in,” cried Jim, holding a lantern, which he had lit that he might look round, to the place.
We stopped it as we had the first.
“It will be a mercy if there are no other holes in the side under the cargo,” he said. “We’ll try the well.”
We returned on deck, and Jim sounded the well.
“Six feet of water or more,” he said, in a mournful tone, as he examined the rod.