sland.

It was two boats from the town, in the foremost of which we could now
make out the figures of Captain Nutter and Binny Wallace's father. We
shrunk back on seeing him.

"Thank God!" cried Mr. Wallace, fervently, as he leaped from the wherry
without waiting for the bow to touch the beach.

But when he saw only three boys standing on the sands, his eye wandered
restlessly about in quest of the fourth; then a deadly pallor overspread
his features.

Our story was soon told. A solemn silence fell upon the crowd of rough
boatmen gathered round, interrupted only by a stifled sob from one poor
old man, who stood apart from the rest.

The sea was still running too high for any small boat to venture out; so
it was arranged that the wherry should take us back to town, leaving the
yawl, with a picked crew, to hug the island until daybreak, and then set
forth in search of the Dolphin.

Though it was barely sunrise when we reached town, there were a great
many people assembled at the landing eager for intelligence from missing
boats. Two picnic parties had started down river the day before, just
previous to the gale, and nothing had been beard of them. It turned out
that the pleasure-seekers saw their danger in time, and ran ashore on
one of the least exposed islands, where they passed the night. Shortly
after our own arrival they appeared off Rivermouth, much to the joy of
their friends, in two shattered, dismasted boats.

The excitement over, I was in a forlorn state, physically and mentally.
Captain Nutter put me to bed between hot blankets, and sent Kitty
Collins for the doctor. I was wandering in my mind, and fancied myself
still on Sandpeep Island: now we were building our brick-stove to cook
the chowder, and, in my delirium, I laughed aloud and shouted to my
comrades; now the sky darkened, and the squall struck the island: now I
gave orders to Wallace how to manage the boat, and now I cried because
the rain was pouring in on me through the holes in the tent. Towards
evening a high fever set in, and it was many days before my grandfather
deemed it prudent to tell me that the Dolphin had been found, floating
keel upwards, four miles southeast of Mackerel Reef.

Poor little Binny Wallace! How strange it seemed, when I went to
school again, to see that empty seat in the fifth row! How gloomy the
playground was, lacking the sunshine of his gentle, sensitive face! One
day a folded sheet slipped from my algebra; it wa