, my friend, what is going to become of us?" asked the doctor.

"Who can say?" answered Johnson.

"At any rate," continued the doctor, "don't let us give way to
despair; let us be men!"

"Yes, Doctor," answered the old sailor, "you are right; it's when
matters look worst that we most need courage; we are in a bad way; we
must see how we can best get out of it."

"Poor ship!" said the doctor, sighing; "I had become attached to it; I
had got to look on it as on my own home, and there's not left a piece
that can be recognized!"

"Who would think, Doctor, that this mass of dust and ashes could be so
dear to our heart?"

"And the launch," continued the doctor, gazing around, "was it
destroyed too?"

"No, Doctor; Shandon and the others, who left, took it with them."

"And the gig?"

"Was broken into a thousand pieces. See, those sheets of tin are all
that's left of her."

"Then we have nothing but the Halkett-boat?"[1]

[Footnote 1: Made of india-rubber, and capable of being inflated at
pleasure.]

"That is all, and it is because you insisted on our taking it, that we
have that."

"It's not of much use," said the doctor.

"They were a pack of miserable, cowardly traitors who ran away!" said
Johnson. "May they be punished as they deserve!"

"Johnson," answered the doctor, mildly, "we must remember that their
suffering had worn upon them very much. Only exceptional natures
remain stanch in adversity, which completely overthrows the weak. Let
us rather pity than curse them!"

After these words the doctor remained silent for a few minutes, and
gazed around uneasily.

"What is become of the sledge?" asked Johnson.

"We left it a mile back."

"In care of Simpson?"

"No, my friend; poor Simpson sank under the toil of the trip."

"Dead!" cried the boatswain.

"Dead!" answered the doctor.

"Poor fellow!" said Johnson; "but who knows whether we may not soon be
reduced to envying his fate?"

"But we have brought back a dying man in place of the one we lost,"
answered the doctor.

"A dying man?"

"Yes, Captain Altamont."

The doctor gave the boatswain in a few words an account of their
finding him.

"An American!" said Johnson, thoughtfully.

"Yes; everything seems to point that way. But what was this _Porpoise_
which had evidently been shipwrecked, and what was he doing in these
waters?"

"He came in order to be lost," answered Johnson; "he brought his crew
to death, like all those whose foolh