The Cruise of the Dainty | Page 7

brother gave his last directions.
"I'll do my best, Mr Harry, and I pray that you may have a successful voyage, and when you return find all things going on well," he said, as he shook hands with us all.
The anchor was then hove up, and sail being made, we stood out of the harbour, while Mr Humby returned on shore, waving his last adieus.
The first part of our voyage was uneventful. We had fine weather, a fair wind, and a smooth sea, and the ladies soon got accustomed to their life on board, declaring that it was even more pleasant than they had expected, though they should like occasionally to get sight of some of the beautiful islands of the Pacific, of which they had so often heard.
We left New Caledonia and the Loyalty Islands on our port side, then steered to the north between the New Hebrides and the Fiji Islands, at neither of which my brother wished to touch.
Day after day we sailed on without sighting land, and at last Emily exclaimed, "What has become of the islands we have heard so much about? I thought we should not pass a day without seeing several of them. They appear on the chart to be very close together, like the constellations in the sky."
"But if you will measure off on the chart the distances they are apart, you will easily understand how it is we have sailed so far without seeing them," said Harry.
The very next day, as Fanny was looking over the starboard side, Harry pointed out to her several blue hillocks rising out of the ocean, which he told her were the northern islands of Fiji, the habitation of a dark-skinned race, once the most notorious cannibals in the Pacific.
"I am very glad to keep away from them, then," answered Fanny, "for I shouldn't at all like to run the risk of being captured and eaten."
"Not much chance of that," said Harry. "The larger number of them have given up their bad habits, and promise to become as civilised as any of the people in these seas."
"Still, I would rather not go near their shores," said Fanny.
She little thought at the time that there were many other islands in every direction, the inhabitants of which were quite as savage as those of Fiji had been.
From the first, Tom Platt had taken a fancy to Dick, who had hitherto behaved himself remarkably well.
"We'll make a seaman of the lad, if he only sticks to it," he said to me. "The rope's-endings, as he tells me he used to get aboard the Eclipse, did him a world of good, though he didn't think so."
I always treated Dick in a friendly way, though he was before the mast, and I was glad to find that he did not presume on this, but willingly did whatever he was ordered. Tom had had a hammock slung for Dick near his berth away from the men, whose conversation, he said, was not likely to do him any good.
Our life on board was very regular; Tom and I kept watch and watch, the crew being divided between us, while Harry, as captain, was on deck at all hours whenever he thought it necessary.
CHAPTER TWO.
The calm which I described at the commencement of my narrative had continued for many hours, and when the sun sank beneath the horizon there was not the slightest sign of a coming breeze. It was my first watch, and before Harry went below he charged me to keep a careful look-out, and to call him should there be any sign of a change of weather. The schooner still floated motionless on the water; scarcely a sound was heard, except the cheeping of the main boom, and the low voices of the men forward, as they passed the watch spinning their oft-told yarns to each other.
I slowly paced the deck, enjoying the comparative coolness of the night, after the intense heat of the day. The stars in the southern hemisphere were shining brilliantly overhead, reflected in the mirror-like ocean. The watch at length were silent, and had apparently dropped off to sleep, though I could see the figure of the man on the look-out as he paced up and down or leaned over the bulwarks. Suddenly, the stillness was broken by a dull splash. I started; it seemed to me as if some one had fallen overboard, but it was only one of the monsters of the deep poking its snout for an instant above the surface, and when I looked over the side it had disappeared. Occasionally I heard similar sounds at various distances. I had some difficulty in keeping myself awake, though by continuing my walk I was able to do so; but I was not sorry when the