le across the bay, when Terence, who was the worst
swimmer of the three, and who had been allowing his legs to droop,
struck his toes against something more substantial than salt water.

"I' faith!" gasped he, with exhausted breath, "I think I've touched
bottom. Blessed be the Virgin, I have!" he continued, at the same time
standing erect, with head and shoulders above the surface of the water.

"All right!" cried Harry, imitating the upright attitude of the young
Hibernian. "Bottom it must be, and bottom it is. Thank God for it!"

Colin, with a similar grateful ejaculation, suspended his stroke, and
stood upon his feet.

All three instinctively faced seaward--as they did so, exclaiming--

"Poor Old Bill!"

"In troth, we might have brought him along with us!" suggested Terence,
as soon as he had recovered his wind; "might we not?"

"If we had but known it was so short a swim," said Harry, "it is
possible."

"How about our trying to swim back? Do you think we could do it?"

"Impossible!" asserted Colin.

"What, Colin, you are the best swimmer of us all! Do you say so?" asked
the others, eager to make an effort for saving the old salt, who had
been the favorite of every officer aboard the ship.

"I say impossible," replied the cautious Colin; "I would risk as much as
any of you, but there is not a reasonable chance of saving him, and
what's the use of trying impossibilities? We'd better make sure that
we're safe ourselves. There may be more deep water between us and the
shore. Let us keep on till we've set our feet on something more like
terra firma."

The advice of the young Scotchman was too prudent to be rejected; and
all three, once more turning their faces shoreward, continued to advance
in that direction.

They only knew that they were facing shoreward by the inflow of the
tide, but certain that this would prove a tolerably safe guide, they
kept boldly on, without fear of straying from the track.

For a while they waded; but, as their progress was both slower and more
toilsome, they once more betook themselves to swimming. Whenever they
felt fatigued by either mode of progression, they changed to the other;
and partly by wading and partly by swimming, they passed through another
mile of the distance that separated them from the shore. The water then
became so shallow, that swimming was no longer possible; and they waded
on, with eyes earnestly piercing the darkness, each moment expecting to
see some