anchor and making for the Bar. All was secure. Mrs. Vickers and the
child were safely below. The two remaining soldiers (two had gone with
Frere) were upon deck, and the prisoners in the forecastle were singing.
The wind was fair, and the sea had gone down. In less than an hour the
Osprey would be safely outside the harbour.

CHAPTER VIII. THE POWER OF THE WILDERNESS.

The drifting log that had so strangely served as a means of saving Rufus
Dawes swam with the current that was running out of the bay. For some
time the burden that it bore was an insensible one. Exhausted with his
desperate struggle for life, the convict lay along the rough back of
this Heaven-sent raft without motion, almost without breath. At length a
violent shock awoke him to consciousness, and he perceived that the log
had become stranded on a sandy point, the extremity of which was lost in
darkness. Painfully raising himself from his uncomfortable posture,
he staggered to his feet, and crawling a few paces up the beach, flung
himself upon the ground and slept.

When morning dawned, he recognized his position. The log had, in passing
under the lee of Philip's Island, been cast upon the southern point of
Coal Head; some three hundred yards from him were the mutilated sheds of
the coal gang. For some time he lay still, basking in the warm rays of
the rising sun, and scarcely caring to move his bruised and shattered
limbs. The sensation of rest was so exquisite, that it overpowered all
other considerations, and he did not even trouble himself to conjecture
the reason for the apparent desertion of the huts close by him. If there
was no one there--well and good. If the coal party had not gone, he
would be discovered in a few moments, and brought back to his island
prison. In his exhaustion and misery, he accepted the alternative and
slept again.

As he laid down his aching head, Mr. Troke was reporting his death to
Vickers, and while he still slept, the Ladybird, on her way out, passed
him so closely that any one on board her might, with a good glass, have
espied his slumbering figure as it lay upon the sand.

When he woke it was past midday, and the sun poured its full rays upon
him. His clothes were dry in all places, save the side on which he had
been lying, and he rose to his feet refreshed by his long sleep. He
scarcely comprehended, as yet, his true position. He had escaped, it
was true, but not for long. He was versed in the history o