reen object, passed quite through it,
and came up immediately afterwards, pure and unsullied, while the
mysterious tail moved quietly as before!

"Now," said Peterkin, gravely, "that brute is a heartless monster; I'll
have nothing more to do with it."

"I'm pretty sure now," said Jack, "that it is merely a phosphoric light;
but I must say I'm puzzled at its staying always in that exact spot."

I also was much puzzled, and inclined to think with Jack that it must be
phosphoric light; of which luminous appearance we had seen much while on
our voyage to these seas. "But," said I, "there is nothing to hinder us
from diving down to it, now that we are sure it is not a shark."

"True," returned Jack, stripping off his clothes; "I'll go down, Ralph,
as I'm better at diving than you are. Now then, Peterkin, out o' the
road!" Jack stepped forward, joined his hands above his head, bent over
the rocks, and plunged into the sea. For a second or two the spray
caused by his dive hid him from view, then the water became still, and we
saw him swimming far down in the midst of the green object. Suddenly he
sank below it, and vanished altogether from our sight! We gazed
anxiously down at the spot where he had disappeared, for nearly a minute,
expecting every moment to see him rise again for breath; but fully a
minute passed, and still he did not reappear. Two minutes passed! and
then a flood of alarm rushed in upon my soul, when I considered that
during all my acquaintance with him, Jack had never stayed underwater
more than a minute at a time; indeed seldom so long.

"Oh, Peterkin!" I said, in a voice that trembled with increasing anxiety,
"something has happened. It is more than three minutes now!" But
Peterkin did not answer and I observed that he was gazing down into the
water with a look of intense fear mingled with anxiety, while his face
was overspread with a deadly paleness. Suddenly he sprang to his feet
and rushed about in a frantic state, wringing his hands, and exclaiming,
"Oh, Jack, Jack! he is gone! It must have been a shark, and he is gone
for ever!"

For the next five minutes I know not what I did. The intensity of my
feelings almost bereft me of my senses. But I was recalled to myself by
Peterkin seizing me by the shoulder and staring wildly into my face,
while he exclaimed, "Ralph! Ralph! perhaps he has only fainted. Dive for
him, Ralph!"

It seemed strange that this did not occur to me sooner. In