main some time on the island?" said
Desmond.

"Of course; it may be for months or years, or we may get off in a few
days or weeks. Had we a good carpenter among us, we might have built a
vessel from the wreck, should she hold together long enough for us to
bring a good portion of her planking and timber ashore; but I am very
certain that none of us are capable of that, although we have a stock of
carpenter's tools."

"There is nothing like trying," said Desmond. "I have seen ships being
built; and if we can obtain timber, we might manage in time to put one
together large enough to carry us at once to Guam or to the Sandwich
Islands."

"We will hear what the doctor says. What do you think about it, Bird?"

"Well, sir, I have helped to rig many a craft, but cannot say that I
ever worked as a shipwright, though I am ready to try my hand at that or
anything else, and `where there's a will there's a way.'"

"What do you say, Pat?" asked Tom.

"As to that, Mr Rogers, when a man has been a Prime Minister, he ought
to think himself fit for anything; and sooner than live on a dissolute
island all me life, I'd undertake to build a ninety-gun ship, if I had
the materials."

The answers of the two seamen made Tom think that Desmond's proposal
was, at all events, worth consideration.

"Well, if we find we can get timber enough from the wreck, I don't see
why we should not make the attempt," he said, after turning over the
matter in his mind.

"I'll undertake that we can build a vessel of ten or fifteen tons, which
will carry us to the Sandwich Islands," observed Desmond, confidently.
"I have got the idea in my head, though I cannot promise that she will
be much of a clipper, but she shall keep afloat, beat to windward, and
stand a pretty heavy sea."

Tom and Desmond discussed the matter as they walked along. Presently
Pat, who had started on ahead, cried out, "Arrah! here she is, all
right, if not all tight," and he pointed to a little sandy bay, almost
at the extreme northern end of the island. There lay the boat on the
beach. She had narrowly missed being swept round the island, when she
would in all probability have been lost unless some counter current, on
the lee side, had driven her back. She had escaped also another danger,
that of being dashed to pieces against a rugged ledge close to which she
must have passed. The party hurried up to her to ascertain what damage
she had received. The surf had evidentl