"

"I did not think of that, sir; yes, I expect you are right; and in that
case it is still more necessary to hunt for water. If we can find it
within four or five miles either side of the wreck we are all right,
because the _Tiger_ could not come here without our seeing her; but I
should not like to be much further away. However, most of these islands
have water, especially when they are hilly; and as we have been lucky so
far, it will be hard if we don't find a stream of some sort along ten
miles of shore."

The next morning they set out on a tour of exploration. They were not long
before they came upon many relics of the wreck: planks, spars, and remains
of the cargo. They lay nearly two hundred yards from the shore, and bore
no signs of the rough usage that had marked the wreckage among the rocks.

"Hurrah! there are some tubs," Joyce shouted, as they reached the top of a
low sand-hill. They broke into a run, and were soon standing beside six
casks, lying a short distance apart.

"Salt junk," Wilcox said, as they looked at the cask they first came to,
"and no bad thing either; cocoa-nuts are good for drink, but that soft,
pulpy stuff inside don't go very far; and after a chap has been eating it
for a week he wants to get his teeth into something more substantial. This
ain't no good," he went on, giving a kick at the next cask, "unless the
natives come up and we open trade with them. These are goods they shipped
at Calcutta. This is better," he went on, as he looked at the next; "this
'ere is biscuits; and with biscuits and salt junk, and a banana now and
then, no man need grumble."

The next two were, like the second, filled with trade articles; the last
was a cask of flour.

"Well, we can stop here a couple of months if we like, gentlemen, if we
can but hit upon water; for that, of course, we must look beyond the line
of sand; a river can cut through it, but a little stream would find its
way underneath the sand to the sea."

As they approached the rocky ground, which rose like a ridge, and could be
traced far inland, the sailor said: "This is the most likely spot. Any
water that came down from the hills would run along at the foot of these
rocks to the sea."

"I think that you are right, Wilcox; the foliage looks brighter along by
the rocks than it does anywhere else, and I should not be surprised if we
found a stream there."

As they approached the rocks within a hundred yards, the hope became a
certai