n was not
seen, the heat, as the day drew on, became intense. Dio was the only
person on board who did not seem to feel it, but went about his duties
as cook's mate with as much zeal and alacrity as ever, scrubbing away at
pots and pans, scraping potatoes, and singing snatches of odd nigger
songs. His monkey Queerface, brought from his last ship, just paid off
on her return from the West Indies, was skipping about the fore-rigging,
now hanging by his tail swinging to and fro, now descending with the
purpose of attempting to carry off one of the boy's hats, then failing,
scudding hand over hand up the rigging again like lightning, chattering
and spluttering as he watched the rope's end lifted threateningly
towards him, or dodging the bit of biscuit or rotten potato thrown at
his head. The watch on deck were hanging listlessly about, finding even
their usual employment irksome. A few old hands might have been seen
making a grummit or pointing a rope, while the sailmaker and his crew
were at work on a suite of boat-sails; here and there also a marine
might have been seen cleaning his musket, but finding the barrel rather
hotter to touch than was pleasant. In truth, everywhere it was hot:
below, hotter still. Though the sun was not shining, there was no
shade; and discontented spirits kept moving about, in vain trying to
find a cooler spot than the one they had left. Old Grim did nothing but
growl.

"If it's hot out here, what will it be when we gets ashore?" he growled
out. "Why, we shall be regularly roasted or baked, and the cannibals
won't have any trouble in cooking us. But to my mind (and I have always
said it) a sailor is the most unfortunate chap alive, one day dried up
in these burning latitudes, and then sent to cool his nose up among the
icebergs. It's all very well for Dio there. It's his nature to like
heat. For us poor white-skinned chaps, it's nothing but downright
cruelty."

"But I suppose that it won't be always like this," said Bill. "We shall
have the sun shine, and a breeze, one of these days, and go along
merrily through the water. There's no place, that I ever heard tell of,
where the sun does not shine, and though we don't see him, he is shining
as bright as ever up above the clouds, even now. He has only got to
open a way for himself through them, and we shall soon see him again."

"As to the sun shining always, you are wrong there, young chap," growled
out old Grim. "Up at the Nor