her, fur she ain't water-logged, an', more'n that, I don't s'pose
her stores are all soaked up in salt water.' There was some sense in
that, an' when the steamer had got to within half a mile of us, we was
glad to see a boat put out from her with three men in it. It was a
queer boat, very low an' flat, an' not like any ship's boat I ever see.
But the two fellers at the oars pulled stiddy, an' pretty soon the boat
was 'longside of us, an' the three men on our deck. One of 'em was the
first mate of the other wreck, an' when he found out what was the
matter with us, he spun his yarn, which was a longer one than ours.
His vessel was the Water Crescent, nine hundred tons, from 'Frisco to
Melbourne, an' they had sailed about six weeks afore we did. They was
about two weeks out when some of their machinery broke down, an' when
they got it patched up it broke ag'in, worse than afore, so that they
couldn't do nothin' with it. They kep' along under sail for about a
month, makin' mighty poor headway till the typhoon struck 'em, an' that
cleaned their decks off about as slick as it did ours, but their
hatches wasn't blowed off, an' they didn't ship no water wuth
mentionin', an' the crew havin' kep' below, none of 'em was lost. But
now they was clean out of provisions an' water, havin' been short when
the breakdown happened, fur they had sold all the stores they could
spare to a French brig in distress that they overhauled when about a
week out. When they sighted us they felt pretty sure they'd git some
provisions out of us. But when I told the mate what a fix we was in
his jaw dropped till his face was as long as one of Andy's hands.
Howsomdever, he said he'd send the boat back fur as many men as it
could bring over, an' see if they couldn't git up some of our stores.
Even if they was soaked with salt water, they'd be better than nothin'.
Part of the cargo of the Water Crescent was tools an' things fur some
railway contractors out in Australier, an' the mate told the men to
bring over some of them irons that might be used to fish out the
stores. All their ship's boats had been blowed away, an' the one they
had was a kind of shore boat for fresh water, that had been shipped as
part of the cargo, an' stowed below. It couldn't stand no kind of a
sea, but there wasn't nothin' but a swell on, an' when it come back it
had the cap'n in it, an' five men, besides a lot of chains an' tools.

"Them fellers an' us worked pretty nigh