ang to his feet, and stared wildly at his
companion, with that dull, heavy, dreamy look in the eyes, which tells
that though the muscular energy of the body may be awake, the mind is
still fast plunged in sleep.

Then both rubbed their eyes, and Vince did more: he knelt down, leaned
over the side of the boat, and plunging both hands in, scooped up the
cool sparkling water, and bathed face and temples till his brain grew
clearer, and he stood up again, dabbing his face with his handkerchief.

"Do as I do. Do you hear, Mike? I say, you're asleep!"

"Sleep?" said Mike, looking at him vacantly.

"Yes, asleep. Rouse up and look! It's wonderful! Here, if you won't,
I must. Kneel down."

He pressed upon the boy's shoulders; and Mike, without making the
slightest resistance, knelt in the bottom of the boat. He yielded too
as Vince pressed a hand upon the back of his head, and then splashed
some water in his face.

The effect was electrical. The next minute Mike was bathing his brows,
throwing up the water with both hands; and as he felt the refreshing
coolness send an invigorating and calming thrill through every nerve, he
rose up and stood drying himself and gazing round, wondering whether he
was yet awake, or this was part of some strange, wild dream.

Vince did not speak, but stood there watching him, while the boat glided
on, as it had all through the night, with unerring regularity; and there
before them was the great watery oval they had gone on traversing,
dotted with sea-birds, while now, instead of the mighty cliffs around,
looking black, overhanging and forbidding, they were beautiful in the
extreme, both in the morning light and their deep empurpled shades.

Mike looked and looked up at the highest cliffs on his left, over the
rapidly gliding water to his right, where the great ridge was dotted
with sea-birds, and away to fore and aft, where the lofty overhanging
rocks were repeated.

"I say," cried Mike at last, "am I awake?"

"If you're not, I'm fast asleep," said Vince.

"But how did we get here?"

"I don't know. Through some narrow passage, I suppose; and then, as
soon as we got in, we must have been going on round and round, and round
and round, thinking that we were getting out to sea. I say, no wonder
it seemed so far!"

"Then it is true," said Mike excitedly. "I don't know that cave,
though."

"No, we never saw that before," said Vince, as they were swept by a low
archway, and the