ave which breaks even on a
weather shore, especially after a gale, although the wind may have
changed.

The tackles having been arranged, they lost no time in launching their
raft, which they did very successfully, easing it with handspikes; and
in a couple of minutes it floated, to their great satisfaction, safely
alongside. Their first care was to lash the casks under the bottom.
This took some time, but they were well repaid by finding the raft float
buoyantly on the very surface of the water.

The cargo had, however, to be got on board, consisting of the three
chests, which, of course, would bring it down somewhat. They lowered
one after the other, and lashed them in the positions they had intended.
The foremost chest was secured over all by ropes, as that had not to be
opened, and was to serve only as a step for their mast; the other two
chests were secured by their handles both fore and aft and athwartships,
the lashings contributing to bind the raft still more securely together.

Daylight had now broken, and they were in a hurry to get on with their
work, but this did not prevent them from securing everything
effectually.

They next had to get their stores into the chests; and lastly they
stepped and set up the mast, securing the sail ready for hoisting to the
halyards, which had been previously rove.

They surveyed their work when completed with no little satisfaction, and
considered, not without reason, that they might, in moderate weather,
run across Channel, provided the wind should remain anywhere in the
southward.

They well knew that they must run the risk of a northerly wind or a
gale. In the first case, though they need not go back, they could make
little or no progress; but then there was always the hope of being
picked up by an English craft, either a man-of-war or a merchant vessel.

They might, to be sure, be fallen in with by a Frenchman, but in the
event of that happening, they intended to beg hard for their liberty.

Should a gale arise, as Jack observed, they would look blue, but they
hoped that their raft would even weather that out. That it would come
to pieces they had no fear; and they believed that they could cling on
to it till the sea should again go down.

They had put on board a sufficient supply of spare rope to lash
themselves to the chests.

Jack climbed up for the last time on deck, and handed down the three
sweeps, taking a look round to see that nothing was left beh