The Three Admirals

by William Henry Giles Kingston

“We must get rollers under her, or it will be more than we can do to drag her into the water,” observed Jerry, as he stamped his foot into the soft yielding sand under her keel.

“You are right,” said Tom, “and we must make them the first thing in the morning.”

The songs sung and yarns spun that evening were not so cheerful as they had been; indeed, all hands were so sleepy that they were glad to turn in as soon as supper was over. Tom hoped against hope, that the next morning the ship would appear, had no accident happened to her. Even without her machinery she would surely be able to beat up to the island by this time.

Tom was at the flag-staff as soon as the light enabled him to see his way up the hill. He waited, gazing anxiously at the horizon, while the ruddy glow which suffused itself over the sky, announced the rising of the sun. But no sail appeared. “She will not come at all,” he exclaimed to himself; “she must have been driven on the rocks during that fearful night, and probably all hands have perished. Poor Archie, I wish he had come with us, and I am very, very sorry for all the rest.”

Tom, however, well knew that he must not give way to his melancholy forebodings, and that, at all events, it was his duty to try and keep up the spirits of his companions. On returning to the tent he put on as unconcerned a countenance as possible, and sat down to breakfast as if he had nothing on his mind. The high flavour of the pork showed him that they must, in the first place, look out for another hog, and some means must be found for preserving it. Pat asserted that the hams were still very good, and Tom suggested that they should be immediately smoked, until salt could be scraped from the rocks, or obtained by evaporation. “You see we have got plenty to do, and even if we spend a month here, we shall have no time to be idle,” he observed.

Jerry and Tim, before they recommenced digging, cut with their axes a number of rollers, which were then placed under the boat’s keel, when with renewed ardour all hands set to work to clear away the intervening sand. It took, however, much longer than they had expected, and another day was drawing to a close before they could attempt to begin launching her. She was moved, however, but a few feet cut of the hollow in which she had been imbedded, as there was no object to be gained that night by putting her in the water, although the bay was now so smooth that she might have floated in perfect safety.

Tom made his usual visit to Flag-staff Hill, and came back with the same report as on the previous evening.

“Before we launch our boat,” he said, when he rejoined the party at breakfast, “we must dismantle our tent; and indeed it is not wise to wear out our sail by using it as a roof. We may want it, and we shall certainly require the oars. I therefore propose, should the ship not appear by noon, to build a hut in the place of the tent, and we shall then have shelter, should we require it, at night. We cannot tell what we may need. The hurricane season is not yet over, we may depend upon that. We came in for the first blow, and there may be several others before the weather becomes settled.”

“What! Do you think the ship’s not coming back for us?” asked Billy, in an anxious tone. “I should like to change my clothes, and I wish we had some tea and sugar, and some hard tack, and pepper, mustard, and all sorts of things.”

“As to the ship’s coming back, it’s possible she may not,” observed Tom. “If she does not, we must manage to do without the things we should like to have, and make the best of those we have got.”