up with her.

"A ship, Charley, a ship!" cried Dick. "And we must do what we can to
make her see us, or she may be passing by, and we shall be no better off
than we are now."

He instantly took off his shirt, which he fastened by its sleeves to the
pole. Holding it aloft as the ship drew near, with all his strength he
waved it to and fro, shouting out in his anxiety, and not aware how low
and hollow his voice sounded. Charley shouted too, with his childish
treble, though their united voices could not have reached by a long way
as far as the ship was from them. It seemed to Dick that she would pass
at some distance: his heart sank. Presently his eye brightened.

"She has altered her course; she is standing this way," he cried out.
"Charley, we shall be picked up!"

"Then I thank God--He hear my prayer. I ask ship come--ship do come,"
said Charley.

"You are right, boy--you are right!" cried Dick. "And I was forgetting
all about that prayer of yours."

The tall ship glided rapidly over the ocean, the surface of which was
now rippled with miniature wavelets as the freshening breeze swept
across it.

"To my eye, she is a foreign ship of war," observed Dick. "But a friend
in need is a friend indeed, and we may be thankful to be taken on board
by her or any other craft. Even if a `Mounseer' had offered to pick us
up, I would not have refused."

The ship approaching was hove-to, a boat being lowered from her, which,
with rapid strokes, pulled towards the raft.

CHAPTER FOUR.

THE PIRATE SHIP.

Dick and the little boy were lifted off the raft, with the basket and
cask, and placed in the stern of the boat. The crew were swarthy
fellows with red caps, and Dick at once saw that the uniform worn by the
officers in command was neither English nor French. They appeared to be
talking gibberish, but such indeed were all foreign languages to him.
He asked Charley if it was the French lingo.

"Not know what they say," answered Charley.

"I suppose, however, that they will give us something to eat and drink,"
observed Dick. "And so, whoever they may be, we shall be better off
than on the raft."

On getting alongside, Dick was hoisted on board, and one of the men
carried Charley up in his arms.

Numerous questions were at once put to Dick, every one seeming anxious
to know how he and the boy came to be on the raft. He replied by
pointing to his lips, and showing by other signs that he was hungry and
th