lows on deck must have found it bitterly cold."

"Not a doubt of that," said Captain Dinks laughing. "I was almost half-
frozen in the mizzen rigging; and as for poor Frank Harness, when he
came off the fore-scuttle, where he was stationed all night to pass the
word from the look-outs forward, he could hardly move his limbs! If it
hadn't been for the hot coffee our friend Snowball served out every two
hours to warm us up, I don't believe any of us would have been alive
this morning. But here comes your father. How sly your were all to
keep it so carefully concealed that he was in the navy; and I taking him
all the time for a lubberly landsman! I'll never forgive myself; for
you must all have laughed at me, especially you, Miss Kate, and your
roguish little sister. Ah! good morning, Mr Meldrum," added the
captain turning to that gentleman; "I was just thinking about you. I
wanted to have a consultation about our course. My dead reckoning is
all at sea, and I hardly can guess where we are now; but I trust we
shall be able to get an observation of the sun at noon, and then we will
be able to prick off our position on the chart."

"I sincerely hope so," said Mr Meldrum; "for I think we're going far
too much to the southward."

"Do you, still, eh?" replied Captain Dinks. "I don't quite agree with
you. I thought it best to keep the ship before the wind, not only
because it eases her but on account of the gale being bound to slacken
down soon; and if we run down to a lower latitude, as I have frequently
done in this part of the ocean before, we will probably get fine weather
and be able to tinker up the old craft and make her look all a taunto
again."

"Ah!" said Mr Meldrum, "you are just as likely to run on to something
else, not quite so pleasant as fine weather! Mark my words, Captain
Dinks, I am as certain, and more so now than I was three days ago, as I
told you then, that we are far down in the Forties; and what with the
easting we have made since passing the meridian of the Cape and the
leeway we have drifted, we must be pretty close to the Crozet Islands or
Kerguelen Land."

"Kerguelen Land!" ejaculated the captain; "nonsense, man; why we are
hundreds of miles to the westward of it."

"Are we?" replied Mr Meldrum. "Well, just wait till twelve o'clock and
we'll see who is right, you or I!"

Hardly, however, had the words escaped his lips than the look-out man in
the maintop--who had been replaced as