operation with tightly clasped hands. Leslie's conjecture as to the
creature's sagacity was fully justified; for upon finding himself in the
water the dog at once began to paddle feebly toward the boat, and in
less time than it takes to tell of it a couple of men had seized him and
dragged him into the boat, in the bottom of which he lay shivering and
panting, and rolling his great trustful eyes from one to the other of
his rescuers.

After this there was little more that the carpenter could do on board.
It was impossible for him to pass along the main deck from the poop to
the forecastle, for the sea was sweeping that part of the derelict so
continuously and in such volume that, had he attempted any such thing,
he must inevitably have been washed overboard. Nor could he, for the
same reason, enter the poop cabin from the main deck; but he peered down
into it through the opening in the deck that had once formed the
skylight; and presently he swung himself down into it and disappeared
from view. Meanwhile the brig, being buoyant, was settling rapidly to
leeward, and soon drifted out of hailing distance. In about ten minutes
from the time of his disappearance the carpenter was seen to climb up
out of the cabin on to the deck and beckon to the men in the boat, who
at once paddled cautiously up alongside; when, watching the roll of the
hull and the heave of the boat alongside, Chips seized a favourable
opportunity and lightly sprang into the smaller craft. The men in her
at once shoved off and, pulling her bows round, gave way for the brig,
the carpenter carefully watching the run of the sea as he sat in the
stern-sheets and steered.

"Here they come!" exclaimed Leslie, watching them. "Lay aft here, men--
all hands of you--and stand by to sway away as soon as they have hooked
on. See that those tackles are well overhauled--give them plenty of
scope to come and go upon!"

Coming down before wind and sea, the boat took but a few minutes to
traverse the distance between the derelict and the brig; and presently,
slipping close past under the stern of the latter, she rounded-to in the
"smooth" of the brig's lee, and shot up alongside. As she did so, the
man who pulled "bow," and Chips, respectively made a lightning-like dash
for the bow and stern tackles, which they simultaneously got hold of and
hooked into the ring-bolts, flinging up their arms as a signal to those
on board to haul taut. Meanwhile the remaining two