r have pumped
out that ship on three biscuit a day, an' only about two days' rations
at that.

"So Andy he come up, so fagged out that it was as much as he could do
to get his clothes on, though they wasn't much, an' then he stretched
himself out under the canvas an' went to sleep, an' it wasn't long
afore he was talkin' about roast turkey an' cranberry sass, an'
punkin-pie, an' sech stuff, most of which we knowed was under our feet
that present minnit. Tom Simmons he just b'iled over, an' sung out:
`Roll him out in the sun an' let him cook! I can't stand no more of
this!' But I wasn't goin' to have Andy treated no sech way as that,
fur if it hadn't been fur Tom Simmons' wife an' young uns, Andy'd been
worth two of him to anybody who was consid'rin' savin' life. But I
give the boy a good punch in the ribs to stop his dreamin', fur I was
as hungry as Tom was, an' couldn't stand no nonsense about Christmas
dinners.

"It was a little arter noon when Andy woke up, an' he went outside to
stretch himself. In about a minute he give a yell that made Tom an' me
jump. `A sail!' he hollered. `A sail!' An' you may bet your life,
young man, that 'twasn't more'n half a second afore us two had scuffled
out from under that canvas, an' was standin' by Andy. `There she is!'
he shouted, `not a mile to win'ard.' I give one look, an' then I sings
out: `'Tain't a sail! It's a flag of distress! Can't you see, you
land-lubber, that that's the Stars and Stripes upside down?' `Why, so
it is,' says Andy, with a couple of reefs in the joyfulness of his
voice. An' Tom he began to growl as if somebody had cheated him out of
half a year's wages.

"The flag that we saw was on the hull of a steamer that had been
driftin' down on us while we was sittin' under our canvas. It was
plain to see she'd been caught in the typhoon, too, fur there wasn't a
mast or a smoke-stack on her. But her hull was high enough out of the
water to catch what wind there was, while we was so low sunk that we
didn't make no way at all. There was people aboard, and they saw us,
an' waved their hats an' arms, an' Andy an' me waved ours; but all we
could do was to wait till they drifted nearer, fur we hadn't no boats
to go to 'em if we'd wanted to.

"`I'd like to know what good that old hulk is to us,' says Tom Simmons.
`She can't take us off.' It did look to me somethin' like the blind
leadin' the blind. But Andy he sings out: `We'd be better off aboard
of