d slowly from side to side. There was, indeed,
great danger that she would be stove in, if not altogether swamped. The
boys, therefore, agreed that the sooner they could get on board the
better.

"We shall find some food, at all events; and if we can get nothing more,
we may shove off again," observed David.

"Oh! I hope we shall get much more than that," exclaimed Harry, in a
confident tone. "What do you think of a compass, and sail, and spars,
and rigging for our boat, and if so we shall without difficulty be able
to find our way home. Hurrah! what do you think of that?"

"I did not fancy that we were likely to be so fortunate," answered
David. "To think that we should have run directly against a ship out in
the ocean here! What shall we do now?"

"Why, get on board ourselves, and then hoist the old man up," answered
Harry. "We must not leave him in the boat, lest she should get stove
in."

The boys quickly scrambled up the ship's side. Both her masts were
gone, and the bowsprit had been carried away, with a considerable
portion of the bulwarks, when the masts fell, and all her boats and
caboose. Altogether she had a very forlorn appearance, while there was
no sign of a human being on board. Their first care was to get up the
old man. Harry leaped down into the cabin of the brig, and instantly
returned with a long horsehair sofa cushion. "We must pass straps round
this, and parbuckle him up," he observed. Fortunately a davit remained.
To this they secured a tackle, and David, jumping into the boat to pass
the cushion under old Jefferies, they soon had him up safe on deck.
They then, having got up the hamper of fish, with the bread and the jar
of water, veered the boat away with a hawser astern. They were now able
for the first time to attend to the old man. They examined his head,
and finding where he had been struck, bathed the place with water, and
they also poured a few drops of water down his throat. This seemed to
revive him greatly, and at last they thought that they might leave him,
to examine the vessel. The cold dull grey light of the early morning
enabled them to do so. The brig had not long been deserted, and great
was their satisfaction to find all sorts of things to eat on board--
biscuits, and even soft bread, though it was rather stale, and a box of
eggs, and bacon and cheese, and even some cooked meat, and there were
also melons, and oranges, and dried figs, and grapes, and othe