, who did not appear to have suffered so much as
his comrade, had seemingly swooned from exhaustion or exposure; as, on
my putting my arm round him and lifting up his bent head, the man opened
his eyes and murmured something faintly in some foreign lingo--Spanish,
I think it was; at any rate a language I did not understand.

But I was unable to notice anything beyond these details, which I
grasped in that one hurried glance; for as I was in the act of raising
up the poor chap in the stern-sheets, the skipper hailed me from the
bridge above.

"Below there!" he sang out. "How are the poor fellows? Are they alive,
Haldane?"

"They are in a bad way, sir," I replied. "They've got the life left in
them and that's all, I'm afraid!"

"Neither dead, then?"

"No, sir."

"Bravo! `whilst there's life there's hope,'" cried the skipper in a
cheery tone. "Are they quite helpless, do you think, Haldane--I mean
quite unable to climb up the side?"

"Quite unable, sir," I answered. "One's unconscious, and I don't think
the other could move an inch if he tried!"

"Then we must haul 'em up," said Captain Applegarth, turning to Masters,
who had popped his head over the bulwarks and was now looking down into
the boat, like the rest of the hands on board. "I say, bo'sun, can't
you rig up a chair or something that we can lower down for the poor
fellows?"

"Aye, aye, sir," responded old Masters, drawing in his head from the
bulwarks and disappearing from my view as I looked upwards from the
stern-sheets, where I was still holding up the slowly-recovering man.
"I'll rig up a whip from the foreyard and we can let down a hammock for
'em, tricing up one at a time."

"Stay, cap'en," cried Mr Fosset as the boatswain went bustling off, I
suppose, though of course from my position I could not see him, to carry
out this plan of his. "The davits here amidship are all right, as well
as the tackle of our cutter that had got washed away in the gale.
Wouldn't it be easier to let down the falls, sir, and run up the boat
all standing with the poor fellows in her as they are?"

"By George, the very thing, Fosset!" exclaimed the skipper, accepting
the suggestion with alacrity. "It will save the poor fellows a lot of
jolting, and be all the easier for us, as you say. Besides, the little
craft will come in handy for us, as we're rather short of boats just
now!"

"Short of boats, sir!" repeated the first mate ironically as he set to
work at