e
English should be such barbarians as to sail away and leave a crippled
ship to its fate?"

"No, no, no, doctor!" cried the Count warmly. "But how could I be so
grasping as to ask you, full of your scientific pursuits as you are, to
stand by us till we can reach the shore in safety?"

"You would not ask it, sir," said the doctor warmly. "There would be no
need. Of course my schooner will stand by you, ready to give you help
until your brig is once more fit for sea."

"Forgive me, doctor!" cried the Count eagerly.

"There is nothing to forgive, sir," replied the doctor, "only I think I
may say that saving in times of war there is no such thing as
nationality amongst those who go to sea. My experience is that they are
always brethren in times of distress."

The Count held out his hand, which was warmly grasped, while the young
French ex-prisoner looked at Rodd with eyes that seemed to speak
volumes.

At this moment the skipper gave a grunt of satisfaction and broke in.

"There's plenty of choice, gentlemen," he said. "I'd venture to say I
could find you the mouths of a dozen sluggish rivers up which you could
go with the tide as far as you liked, and then moor our vessels to the
forest trees, easily finding places close in shore where the tide as it
went out would leave the brig here softly in the mud ready for careening
over in a cradle where she wouldn't strain or open a single seam; and
the doctor here being willing, I'll promise to take the job in hand and
make the brig's bottom as sound as ever it was, even if we have to strip
off a little copper from along the top streak, where it isn't so much
wanted, so as to put new plates where the damaged ones have been."

"I shall be only too glad, Count," said the doctor; "and now I think we
will get back to the schooner, and Captain Chubb here will shape his
course somewhere to the south-east, till within the next few days we
near the coast, when he will select a suitable place for his purpose."

"I cannot find words," said the Count, in a husky voice.

"Don't try," said the doctor.

"No, but--er,"--continued the Count, in rather a hesitating tone, "you
do mean to keep cruising about here--and farther south or west?"

"Don't you give that another thought," said the doctor frankly. "The
schooner is my own, and almost any portion of the ocean or the shore
offers attractions to me and my nephew. We can find interest anywhere.
I only hope that you will not