t matters not;
the long and happy hours and days spent in the companionship of that
battered little mass of wood or wax rush on the infant memory like a
dear delightful dream, and it weeps on separation as if its heart would
break.

Each man in the boat's crew experienced more or less of the same
feeling, and commented, according to his nature, either silently or
audibly, on each familiar object as he gazed upon it for the last time.

"There's the spot where we built the hut when we first landed, Ailie,"
said Glynn, who pulled the aft oar; "d'ye see it?--just coming into
view; look! There it will be shut out again in a moment by the rock
beside the coral-pool."

"I see it!" exclaimed Ailie eagerly, as she brushed away the tears from
her eyes.

"There's the rock, too, where we used to make our fire," said the
captain, pointing it out. "It doesn't look like itself from this point
of view."

"Ah!" sighed Phil Briant, "an' it wos at the fut o' that, too, where we
used to bile the kittle night an' mornin'. Sure it's many a swait bit
and pipe I had beside ye."

"Is that a bit o' the wreck?" inquired Tim Rokens, pointing to the low
rocky point with the eagerness of a man who had made an unexpected
discovery.

"No," replied Mr Millons, shading his eyes with his hands, and gazing
at the object in question, "it's himpossible. I searched every bit o'
the bank for a plank before we came hoff, an' couldn't find a morsel as
big as my 'and. W'at say you, doctor?"

"I think with you," answered Dr Hopley; "but here's the telescope,
which will soon settle the question."

While the doctor adjusted the glass, Rokens muttered that "He wos sure
it wos a bit o' the wreck," and that "there wos a bit o' rock as nobody
couldn't easy git a t'other side of to look, and that that wos it, and
the bit of wreck was there," and much to the same effect.

"So it is," exclaimed the doctor.

"Lay on your oars, lads, a moment," said the captain, taking the glass
and applying it to his eye.

The men obeyed gladly, for they experienced an unaccountable
disinclination to row away from the island. Perhaps the feeling was
caused in part by the idea that when they took their last look at it, it
might possibly be their _last_ sight of land.

"It's a small piece of the foretopmast crosstrees," observed the
captain, shutting up the telescope and resuming his seat.

"Shall we go back an' pick it up, sir?" asked Dick Barnes gravely,
giving ve