This also was a very capital observation;
and its result was that we found ourselves _exactly_ where the island
was stated to be situated, with no land in sight in any direction from
the mast-head.

I must confess that, in spite of the doubts which had lately obtruded
themselves upon my mind, I felt keenly disappointed; and as for Bob, he
was so chop-fallen that he had not a word to say.

It was not until I had carefully gone once more over my calculations of
that day, and had verified the error in our chronometer for which I had
made allowance, and had, in short, satisfied myself thoroughly that we
actually were where we supposed ourselves to be, that I realised how
strongly, notwithstanding my doubts, I had relied upon finding the
island and its buried treasure. So far as the primary object of the
voyage was concerned, it appeared that it had been undertaken in vain;
and had it not been for our accidental acquisition of intelligence
respecting my father, we should now have been without an object for the
further prosecution of the voyage, excepting that of returning home
again as quickly as possible, to secure the best berths we could, and
make up, as far as might be, for lost time.

We had hove the cutter to whilst I was taking and working up my noon
observation; and, as soon as we had fully realised our great
disappointment, I got out the chart, and Bob and I pored over it for a
full hour in the endeavour to fix upon the one island out of the many in
the great Archipelago which was most likely to be the one upon which the
_Amazon_ was cast away. However, there were so many, all of which would
answer equally well to the imperfect description which we had received,
that we were at last obliged to give it up and revert to our original
resolution of examining _all_ the likely places, in the hope that we
should be more successful in our second search than we had proved in our
first.

We therefore filled away upon the cutter again, upon such a course as
would take us up through the thickest cluster of islands; and, such is
the elasticity of the human mind, before night closed down upon us we
appeared to have almost forgotten everything connected with the
treasure-island, and thought and spoke of nothing but the chances in
favour of and against the finding of my father.

CHAPTER NINETEEN.

MY FATHER.

As the sun went down the wind fell light, and we did not average more
than four knots an hour all through the