“A pretty bit of jargon you have managed to string together,” said the colonel, looking more amiable than he had before done, “and that is what I suppose you call a poetical description, missie. Well, as it does not convey a bad idea of what we have before our eyes, it must pass for something of the sort, I suppose. What do you say, Mister Bowse?”
Now, although Bowse had not entirely comprehended all that Ada had said, he felt that he was called on to give an answer, and accordingly looked round the horizon, as if to satisfy himself that her description was correct. He had taken a survey of the whole expanse of the sea to the westward, and his eye had gradually swept round to the east, when, instead of turning round to answer, he kept it fixed on a distant spot just seen over the weather or larboard bow. Shifting his position a little, he placed his telescope to his eye, and took a steady gaze.
“That’s her, I can’t help thinking,” he muttered. “But what she wants out there, I can’t say.”
To the surprise of Ada, he walked forward, and called his mate to his side.
“Here, Mr Timmins, just tell me what you think of that chap out there, over the weather cat-head,” he said, giving his officer the glass.
The mate took the instrument, and looked as he was directed.
“She’s a lateen-rigged craft standing on a wind athwart our course, sir,” answered the mate instantly, as if there was no difficulty in ascertaining thus much.
“That one may see with half an eye, Mr Timmins; but do you see nothing unusual about her?”
“I can’t say that I see any difference between her and the craft, which one is always meeting with in these seas,” answered the mate. “Her canvas stands well, and looks very white as we see her beam almost on to us. She seems one of those vessels with a name I never could manage to speak, which trade along the coast of Sicily and Italy, and come over to Malta.”
“By the way she is standing, she will pass at no great distance to leeward of us, and if she was to haul up a little, she would just about reach us,” observed the master in a tone of interrogation.