Young as Harry Shafto was, by his firmness and decision he had maintained a strict discipline among the little band, and even the few who might have been disposed to be mutinous never ventured to dispute his authority. Even now that he was absent, they implicitly obeyed the doctor, whom he had left in command.
Poor Ensign Holt has not been mentioned for some time. He had gradually been improving in health and spirits.
“Come, Holt,” said Dr Davis to him one morning. “It is time that you should rouse yourself. We are all exerting ourselves to the utmost for the common good, and I wonder you are not ashamed to sit in the hut doing nothing. Surely it is more degrading to eat the bread of idleness than to labour like the rest of us. Take a spade in hand, and come and dig for roots; or, if you like it better, try to catch, some fish. At least endeavour to gain your daily bread.”
“If I do anything, I’ll work as hard as the rest of you,” said the ensign, with more intelligence in his countenance than had long been there. “What are you going to be about, doctor?”
“To dig for roots. That I suspect was among the first occupations of primeval man, and requires no great exertion of the mind,” answered the doctor. “Here is a spade. Come along.”
Without another word the young officer followed his kind friend, and having been shown the leaf beneath which the root was to be found, set to work and dug away diligently till he had collected as many as he could carry. The doctor sent him back to the village with them, and told him to return without delay. All day long he worked away, and seemed very proud of the pile of roots he had dug up. That evening, by the doctor’s invitation, he attended the meeting in the men’s hut, and listened with great attention while Mrs Morley read the Bible. She afterwards spoke a few kind words to him, expressing her pleasure at seeing him so much improved in health. He burst into tears.
“I have been a good-for-nothing foolish fellow,” he said at length. “But oh, Mrs Morley, if you would but take me in hand, I think there might be a chance of my improvement.”
“If you seek for strength and guidance whence alone it can come, you may be very certain there will be an improvement, dear Mr Holt,” said Mrs Morley, kindly. “The trials you have gone through, and may yet have to endure, will then prove a blessing to you. I will gladly give you counsel and advice, but more I cannot do. Let me remind you only of God’s promise, ‘that if you seek you will find; if you knock, it shall be opened unto you.’”
From that day forward a great change was perceptible in the young ensign. He laboured as hard as any one; and whenever he could borrow Mrs Morley’s Bible, he would sit up for hours together at night reading it diligently.
This had occurred some days before Harry went on his expedition to the harbour. The doctor reminded Captain Twopenny of their intention of burying the body of the unfortunate seaman they had found on the beach. He invited Ensign Holt to accompany him, taking also two men, with spades, who also carried their clubs in case they should fall in with seals. He had his gun, and proposed that Holt should take one also. “No,” answered the ensign. “I am but a poor shot, and should only throw away powder. I will carry your game. I am not of use for much else.” Formerly, how indignant he would have been had such an idea been suggested to him.