oils they had gone through, on their way to a place where
they could hope to meet with their ship; at the same time, there was
little comfort to boast of on board. Their berths were narrow recesses
on either side of the little cabin, which was close in the extreme, and
swarmed, moreover, with cockroaches and other creeping things, scorpions
and centipedes, which had come on board with the cargo and occasionally
made their appearance.

"I don't care for the beasts, hungry as they are, but it is not pleasant
to know that one may be stung at any moment by them," said Desmond, as
he brought his knife down on one which had fallen on the breakfast
table.

As long as their fresh provisions lasted, they fared pretty well, but
when these were exhausted, they were reduced to very short commons, and,
as Desmond observed, "very bad of its sort." Salt junk, which had made,
perhaps, more than one voyage round the world, and mouldy biscuit,
constituted the chief ingredients of their meals. The midshipmen
complained, but the skipper replied that he gave them the best he had.
Billy especially declared that he should die of inanition. "Salt junk
never agreed with me at the best of times, and this is more like old
horse than beef," he groaned, as he turned about a piece of
black-looking stuff at the end of his fork.

The men were quite as ill off--they could not be worse; but when they
found their officers faring as badly as they were, they could not
complain. The old brig sailed like a tub even in a breeze, and at last
the wind dropped and they lay becalmed day after day with the sun
striking down on their heads. They had found it hot enough very
frequently in travelling through the country; it was here sometimes even
hotter. On their journey they had had at all events abundance of food,
refreshing fruits, and clear water, while now they had only tepid,
thick, brackish liquid to drink. When they made faces as they poured it
out at meal time, the skipper remarked with a grin--

"You're better off than if we had none, and if we are many weeks longer
on the voyage maybe we shall be in that condition."

Tom suggested that as soon as a breeze sprang up, they should steer for
Brisbane, or one of the northern Australian ports, but the skipper would
not listen to any such proposal. He preferred keeping the open sea,
free of the reefs which existed nearer in with the land. Tom observed
that they were already much further to the eas