w
up and down movement of the raft having the effect of making both the
occupants sleep soundly.

The solitary raft lay on the waste of waters. Hour after hour passed
by, and still the little girl and faithful black slept on, watched over
by One who ever cares for the helpless and distressed who trust in Him.
Hungry sharks might have jumped up and seized them in their maws; huge
whales might have struck the raft with their snouts, and upset it as
they rose above the water; or birds of prey might have pounced down and
struck them with their sharp beaks;--but from all such dangers they were
preserved, while a veil of clouds covered the sky and sheltered them
from the burning rays of the hot sun of that latitude.

At length Nub started up. He had been dreaming that Alice had fallen
overboard, and that he had plunged in after her to save her from a
hungry shark. For a few moments, so confused were his senses, he could
not tell what had happened; then finding himself on the raft, and Alice
sleeping close to him, he recollected all about it. His first impulse
was to stand up and look round, in the hope of seeing the boats; but, as
before, not an object was in sight.

"Well, well, I s'pose de boats come in good time," he said to himself,
sitting down again with a sigh. "We must wait patiently. If any land
was in sight I would row to it, for though de raft might move very
slowly, we should get dere at last; but now, though I pull on all day, I
get nowhere. Better wait till God sends some one to help us. Perhaps
when de breeze gets up again another whaler come dis way and take us on
board." Nub looked at Alice. She was sleeping calmly; and knowing that
the more she slept the better, he would not awake her. He himself felt
very hungry, but he did not like to eat except she was sharing the meal.
He could not, however, refrain from nibbling a piece of biscuit, to try
and stop the gnawings of hunger. Several times he stood up and gazed
anxiously around; sitting down, however, on each occasion with a sigh,
and saying to himself, as before, "No sail, no boat. Well, well, help
come in good time."

At length Alice awoke, and seemed even more surprised than Nub had been
to find herself on the raft. He at once got out the biscuits, and
begged her to eat several, and to take a little wine and water.

"But you are not eating any yourself, Nub," she said.

"I have had some; but I take a little more to keep you company," h