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icultural chemistry, all of which they were going to apply out in Queensland as soon as they got there. Then one bright morning, well supplied with fresh provisions, and, to Mark's great delight, with an ample store of fruit--from bananas, of three or four kinds, to pine-apples, the delicious mangosteen, and the ill-odoured durian, with its wooden husk, delicate custard, and large seeds--the ship continued her course. The sea was like crystal, and with the sun hot, but not to discomfort, and a soft breeze blowing, the great vessel glided gently eastward. It was a trifle monotonous, but this troubled Mark in only small degree, for there was always something fresh to take his attention. Sea-birds were seen; then some fish or another reared itself out of the limpid sea, and fell back with a splash. Then a shoal of some smaller kind rippled the surface as they played about, silvering the blue water with their armoured sides. Small the boatswain and Billy Widgeon rigged up tackle for the lad to fish; and he fished, but caught nothing. "But then, you know, you might have ketched real big fish," said the little sailor encouragingly, "because, you see, you know they are there." It was a consolation, but not much, to one who has tried for days to capture something or another worthy of being placed by the cook upon the captain's table. And so three days of slow progress passed on, after which the progress grew more slow, and ended in a complete calm, just as they were a few miles north of a verdant-looking island, whose waving palms, seen above and beyond a broad belt of dingy mangroves, looked particularly tempting to those who had been cooped up so long on shipboard, where, now that the breeze had sunk, it seemed insufferably hot. "I suppose it can't be hotter than this, Mr Gregory, can it?" asked Mark, soon after noontide on the second day of the calm. "Hotter than this?" said the first-mate with an assumed look of astonishment. "Do you hear him, Morgan? He calls it hot!" "I say, captain," said the major, "how long's this calm going to last?" "Impossible to say," said the captain. "I am hoping for a fresh breeze at sundown, but I dare not prophesy." "Well, then, let's have the boat out and manned, and two or three of us go ashore with our guns, to see if we can't shoot something." The captain hesitated, looked at the sky, at the offing, studied his glass, and then said that there was no prospect
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