kipper sternly.

Without another word Oliver got upon the rope and proceeded to clamber
along it. The operation was by no means easy, but the boy was strong
and active, and the water not very cold. It leaped up and drenched him,
however, as he passed the lowest point of the bight, and thereafter the
weight of his wet garments delayed him, so that on nearing the shore he
was pretty well exhausted. There, however, he found Paul up to the
waist in the sea waiting for him, and the last few yards of the journey
were traversed in his friend's arms.

By means of this rope was every man of the _Water Wagtail's_ crew saved
from a watery grave.

They found that the island on which they had been cast was sufficiently
large to afford them shelter, and a brief survey of it proved that there
was both wood and water enough to serve them, but nothing of animal or
vegetable life was to be found. This was serious, because all their
provisions were lost with the wrecked portion of the ship, so that
starvation stared them in the face.

"If only the rum-kegs had been saved," said one of the men, when they
assembled, after searching the island, to discuss their prospects, "we
might, at least, have led a merry life while it lasted."

"Humph! Much good that would do you when you came to think over it in
the next world," said Grummidge contemptuously.

"I don't believe in the next world," returned the first speaker gruffly.

"A blind man says he doesn't see the sun, and don't believe in it,"
rejoined Grummidge: "does that prove that there's no sun?"

Here Master Trench interposed.

"My lads," he said, "don't you think that instead of talking rubbish it
would be wise to scatter yourselves along the coast and see what you can
pick up from the wreck? Depend on't some of the provisions have been
stranded among the rocks, and, as they will be smashed to pieces before
long, the sooner we go about it the better. The truth is, that while
you have been wastin' your time running about the island, Master Burns
and I have been doin' this, an' we've saved some things already--among
them a barrel of pork. Come, rouse up and go to work--some to the
shore, others to make a camp in the bush."

This advice seemed so good that the men acted on it at once, with the
result that before dark they had rescued two more barrels of pork and a
barrel of flour from the grasp of the sea, besides some cases of goods
which they had not taken time to examine