as well as coral reefs."

"Why, young man," cried Stride in a tone that made old Crossley smile,
"you seem to think nothing at all of coincidences. It's very seldom--
almost never--that one hears of so many coincidences happening on _this_
side o' the line all at once--don't you see."

"I see," returned Red Shirt; "and the same, exactly, may be said of the
_other_ side o' the line. I very seldom--almost never--heard of so many
out there; which itself may be called a coincidence, d'ee see? a sort of
negative similarity."

"Young man, I would suspect you were jesting with me," returned the
Captain, "but for the fact that you told me of your experiences first,
before you could know that mine would coincide with them so exactly."

"Your conclusions are very just, sir," rejoined Red Shirt, with a grave
and respectful air; "but of course coincidences never go on in an
unbroken chain. They _must_ cease sooner or later. We left our wreck
in _three_ boats. No doubt you--"

"There again!" cried the Captain in blazing astonishment, as he removed
his hat and wiped his heated brow, while Mr Crossley's eyes opened to
their widest extent. "_We_ left our wreck in _three_ boats! My ship's
name was--"

"The _Walrus_," said Red Shirt quietly, "and her Captain's name was
Stride!"

Old Crossley had reached the stage that is known as petrified with
astonishment. The Captain, being unable to open his eyes wider, dropped
his lower jaw instead.

"Surely," continued Red Shirt, removing his wide-awake, and looking
steadily at his companions, "I must have changed very much indeed when
two of my--"

"Brooke!" exclaimed Crossley, grasping one of the sailor's hands.

"Charlie!" gasped the Captain, seizing the other hand.

What they all said after reaching this point it is neither easy nor
necessary to record. Perhaps it may be as well to leave it to the
reader's vivid imagination. Suffice it to say, that our hero irritated
the Captain no longer by his callous indifference to coincidences. In
the midst of the confusion of hurried question and short reply, he
pulled them up with the sudden query anxiously put--

"But now, what of my mother?"

"Well--excellently well in health, my boy," said Crossley, "but woefully
low in spirits about yourself--Charlie. Yet nothing will induce her to
entertain the idea that you have been drowned. Of course we have been
rather glad of this--though most of our friends, Charlie, have given yo