rlie.
"I'll soon have the canvas up. I say, look out there! The blooming
thing's heavier than I thought."

"Oh, do be careful!" entreated Belle, as the sail went up in a very
peculiar fashion, and beginning to fill with the breeze sent the boat
heeling sharply over.

"She'll be perfectly right if I slack out. The wind's on our beam,"
replied Charlie; "I must get her a-lee."

"You're going to upset us!" exclaimed Belle, for the sail was flapping
about in such a wild and unsteady manner as seemed to threaten to
overturn the little vessel.

"Not if I make this taut," cried Charlie, hauling away with all his
strength.--"Hilda, that was a near shave!" as the unmanageable canvas,
swelling out suddenly, caught her a blow on the side of her head and
nearly swept her from the boat.

Hilda gave a shriek of terror and clung wildly to the gunwale.

"O Charlie!" she cried, "take us back. I don't like sailing. I want to
go home."

"Oh! why did we ever come?" shrieked Belle, jumping up in her seat and
wringing her hands. "You'll send us to the bottom."

"Sit still, dear," cried Isobel. "You'll upset the boat if you move so
quickly.--Charlie, I think you'd better take down that sail and try the
sculls again. If you'll let me steer perhaps I could manage better than
Hilda, and we could turn out of the current; it's taking us straight to
sea. If we can head round towards the quay we might get back."

"All serene," said Charlie, furling his canvas with secret relief.
"There ought to be several, really, for this job; it takes more than one
to sail a craft properly, and none of you girls know how to help."

He gave Isobel a hand as she moved cautiously into the stern, and
settling her with the ropes, he once more took up the oars.

"I shall come too," wailed Belle. "I can't stay alone at this end of the
boat. Isobel, it's horrid of you to leave me."

"Sit still," commanded Charlie. "It's you who'll have us over if you
jump about like that. We can't all be at one end, I tell you. You must
stop where you are."

He made a desperate effort to turn the boat, but his boyish arms were
powerless against the strength of the ebbing tide, and they were swept
rapidly towards the bar.

"It's no use," said Charlie at last, shipping his sculls; "I can't get
her out of this current. We shall just have to drift on till some one
sees us and picks us up."

"O Charlie!" cried Hilda, her round chubby face aghast with horror,
"shall we float