e and carried it
away while we've been in the woods, an' took Jack and Frank away with
it!"

CHAPTER VIII.

WIGWAGS FROM THE BEACH.

For a long time after the departure of Ned, Jack and Frank sat in the
cabin of the _Manhattan_, looking out on the steady downpour. They were
not quite satisfied with their share in the activities of the day.
Instead of being housed in the cabin, they preferred an exciting hunt
even in the rain, over the hills of the little island in view.

"If we stand for it," grumbled Jack, "we'll have to spend most of our
time keeping house! Jimmie will scatter himself all over the Asiatic
division of the map, and Ned will spend most of his time looking him
up!"

Frank laughed at this outbreak of ill humor, although he was as anxious
as his chum to be on the firing line.

"I wish we'd not taken the _Manhattan_," Jack continued. "I'm the only
one in the party that can operate it, and I'll be tied down like a
galley slave!"

"Go it!" laughed Frank. "Growl your head off, if you want to, Mr. Black
Bear! Instead of snarling, why don't you tell me what makes the boat go
when you do something to the wheel and that switch?"

"I thought you owned a launch?" said Jack.

"Father bought me one," was the reply, "but I've never learned how to
run it. I'm too fat to bother my head about such things!"

"Then what are you asking me about the mechanism of the thing for?"
asked Jack. "If you don't want to know, what's the use of my telling you
how to run a motor boat? You make me weary!"

"If I had a nice little temper like yours," Frank grinned, "I'd go and
bump my head against a tree! Come, old man, tell me about the boat. I
may want to run it some time, after you get caught by a cat or filled
full of poisoned arrows! Come! honest! What makes it go?"

"And you don't even know the action of a gasoline engine?" exclaimed
Jack, in better humor. "Well, I'll tell you. A jet of gasoline, which is
thinner than water, is sprayed, as one would spray any liquid from an
atomizer, into the chamber of the engine cylinder-head, which it reaches
in the form of vapor, having been mixed with air."

"That's all simple!"

"Here the vapor is compressed by the rising piston, and when it is
squeezed up as close as it can be an electric spark is introduced into
the chamber. That is what the electric battery and gear are for."

"I was wondering why one had to have electricity and gasoline both,"
said Frank, very mu