lamp, in consequence of fresh oil being poured into it, the wick
was nearly consumed, and that it must shortly go out, let Roswell's
success be what it might. The news of the sudden and unlooked-for return
of a vessel so long believed to be lost, spread like wildfire over the
whole point, and greatly did it increase the interest of the relatives in
the condition of the dying man. If he was a subject of great concern
before, doubly did he become so now. A vessel freighted with furs would
have caused much excitement of itself; but, by some means or other, the
deacon's great secret of the buried treasure had leaked out, most probably
by means of some of his lamentations during his illness, and, though but
imperfectly known, it added largely to the expectations connected with the
unlooked-for return of the schooner. In short, it would not have been easy
to devise a circumstance that should serve to increase the liveliness of
feeling that, just then, prevailed on the subject of Deacon Pratt and his
assets, than the arrival of the Sea Lion, at that precise moment.

And arrive she did, that tempest-tossed, crippled, ice-bound, and
half-burned little craft, after roaming over an extent of ocean that would
have made up half a dozen ordinary sea voyages. It was, in truth, the
schooner so well known to the reader, that was now settling away her
mainsail and jib, as she kept off, under her fore-topsail alone, towards
the wharf, on which every human being who could, with any show of
propriety, be there at such a moment, was now collected, in a curious and
excited crowd. Altogether, including boys and females, there must have
been not less than a hundred persons on that wharf; and among them were
most of the anxious relatives who were in attendance on the vessel's
owner, in his last hours. By a transition that was natural enough,
perhaps, under the circumstances, they had transferred their interest in
the deacon to this schooner, which they looked upon as an inanimate
portion of an investment that would soon have little that was animate
about it.

Baiting Joe was a sort of oracle, in such circumstances. He had passed his
youth at sea, having often doubled the Horn, and was known to possess a
very respectable amount of knowledge on the subject of vessels of all
sorts and sizes, rig and qualities. He was now consulted by all who could
get near him, as a matter of course, and his opinions were received as
_res adjudicata_, as the lawyer