ap into the sea to his
friend's rescue, and was trembling with fear and hopeless despair.

The next time the _Sea Rover_ came in sight, she was further off, and
appeared to be sailing away from them, although they could see her tack
about in the distance several times, as if searching for them still.

Then it gradually got darker, and night came on, enveloping them in a
curtain of hazy mist that seemed to rest on the water, through which
they could see far off the blue lights that were burnt on board the ship
to show their whereabouts, although they were useless to them, as they
could not reach her.

Even David began to lose hope now, but he still encouraged his
companion.

"They'll not desert us, old fellow," he said, with a heartiness which he
by no means felt. "The captain will lie-to, and will pick us up in the
morning."

Jonathan was not attending to his words, however. He was shivering and
shaking as if he had the ague, and David could hear his teeth chatter
together with the cold, although the wind had gone down somewhat, and
the sea no longer broke over them.

It was so dark that the two lads could scarcely see each other as they
lay on top of the frail structure that separated them from the deep,
clasping each other's hands.

Presently, in the fitful phosphorescent light of the water, some dark
object seemed to float up alongside; and Jonathan gave vent to a scream
of horror, that rang through the silence of the night.

"Oh, what is that?" he exclaimed.

And if David had not clutched him, he would have plunged headlong from
the raft into the sea in his fright and agonised terror.

STORY THREE, CHAPTER FOUR.

ALONE ON THE OCEAN.

For hours the two boys remained in a sort of nameless terror, David
feeling almost as frightened as Jonathan, although he concealed his
fright in order to reassure his companion, with the terrible object that
had excited their fear bobbing up and down alongside them, and
occasionally coming with a crash against their frail raft, that
threatened to annihilate it and send them both into the water, when it
would be all over with them.

The night was pitch dark, for the mist that hung over the surface of the
deep appeared to increase in intensity, and they could not see even the
faint glimmer of a star to cheer them; while all they could hear was the
lapping of the waves as they washed by them, and the ripple and swish of
some billow as it overtopped its crest, and sp