n empty one. Maybe it's been washed
off from some ship, or gone adrift from shore. Put her hard down, Mr.
Tomlinson, for it just so happens that I am in need of a boat at
present."

Half a minute later the _Golden Rod_ had swung round and was running
swiftly down towards the black spot which still bobbed and danced upon
the waves. As they neared her they could see that something was
projecting over her side.

"It's a man's head!" cried Amos Green.

But Ephraim Savage's grim face grew grimmer. "It's a man's foot," said
he. "I think that you had best take the gal below to the cabin."

Amid a solemn hush they ran alongside this lonely craft which hung out
so sinister a signal. Within ten yards of her the foreyard was hauled
aback and they gazed down upon her terrible crew.

She was a little thirteen-foot cockle-shell, very broad for her length
and so flat in the bottom that she had been meant evidently for river or
lake work. Huddled together beneath the seats were three folk, a man in
the dress of a respectable artisan, a woman of the same class, and a
little child about a year old. The boat was half full of water and the
woman and child were stretched with their faces downwards, the fair
curls of the infant and the dark locks of the mother washing to and fro
like water-weeds upon the surface. The man lay with a slate-coloured
face, his chin cocking up towards the sky, his eyes turned upwards to
the whites, and his mouth wide open showing a leathern crinkled tongue
like a rotting leaf. In the bows, all huddled in a heap, and with a
single paddle still grasped in his hand, there crouched a very small man
clad in black, an open book lying across his face, and one stiff leg
jutting upwards with the heel of the foot resting between the rowlocks.
So this strange company swooped and tossed upon the long green Atlantic
rollers.

A boat had been lowered by the _Golden Rod_, and the unfortunates were
soon conveyed upon deck. No particle of either food or drink was to be
found, nor anything save the single paddle and the open Bible which lay
across the small man's face. Man, woman, and child had all been dead a
day at the least, and so with the short prayers used upon the seas they
were buried from the vessel's side. The small man had at first seemed
also to be lifeless, but Amos had detected some slight flutter of his
heart, and the faintest haze was left upon the watch glass which was
held before his mouth. W