ust coming alongside
the boat."

"Aye, aye, sir!" replied Masters promptly, keeping one eye on the
skipper on the bridge and the other directed to the little craft we were
approaching, and now close to our port bow. "We're all ready forrad,
sir. Mind you don't run her down, sir. She's nearly under our
forefoot."

"All right, bo'sun," returned the skipper. "Port, Parrell!"

"Port it is, sir," repeated Tom Parrell. "Two points off."

"Steady, man, steady," continued the skipper, holding his hand up again.
"Boat ahoy! Stand by. We're going to throw you a rope!"

At the same instant Captain Applegarth sounded the engine-room gong
again, bringing the _Star of the North_ to a dead stop as we steamed up
to the boat slanting-wise, the steamer having just sufficient way on her
when the screw shaft ceased revolving, to glide gently up to the very
spot where the little floating waif was gently bobbing up and down on
the wave right ahead of us, and barely half a dozen yards away,
drifting, at the will of the wind, without any guidance from its
occupants, who seemingly were unaware of our approach.

"Boat ahoy!" shouted the skipper once more, raising his voice to a
louder key. "Look-out, there!"

The men in the bows of the boat still remained in the same attitude, as
if unconscious or dead; but the other in the stern-sheets appeared to
hear the skipper's hail, for he half-turned his head and uttered a
feeble sort of noise and made a feeble motion with one of his hands.

"Now's your time, bo'sun!" cried Captain Applegarth. "Heave that line,
sharp!"

"Aye, aye, sir," roared out Masters in his gruff tones. "Stand by,
below there!"

With that the coil of half-inch rope which he held looped on his arm
made a circling whirl through the air, the end falling right across the
gunwales of the boat, close to the after thwart, where sat the second of
the castaways, who eagerly stretched out his hand to clutch at it.

But, unfortunately, he failed to grasp it, and the exertion evidently
being too much for him, for he tumbled forward on his face at the bottom
of the boat, while the rope slipped over the side into the water, coming
back home to us alongside the old barquey on the next send of the sea,
the heavy roll of our ship when she brought up broadside-on, as well as
the weight of the line saturated with water, fetching it in to us all
the sooner.

"Poor fellows; they can't help themselves!" cried the skipper, who had