Roswell was deeply reluctant to protract his stay in the group; but professional pride would have prevented him from deserting a consort under such circumstances, had not a better feeling inclined him to remain and assist Daggett.  It is true the last had, in a manner, thrust himself on him, and the connection had been strangely continued down to that moment; but this he viewed as a dispensation of Providence, to which he was bound to submit.  The result was a declaration of a design to stand by his companion as long as there was any hope of getting the injured craft home.

This decision pointed at once to the delay of another week.  No time was lost in vain regrets, however; but all hands went to work to get the schooner into shallow water again, and to look further for the principal leak.  Accurate trimming and pumping showed that a good deal of the water was already stopped out; but too much still entered to render it prudent to think of sailing until the injury was repaired.  This time the schooner was not suffered to lie on her bilge at all.  She was taken into water just deep enough to permit her to stand upright, sustained by shores, while the tide left two or three streaks dry forward; it being the intention to wind her, should the examination forward not be successful.

On stripping off the copper, it was found that a wood-end had indeed started, the inner edge of the plank having got as far from its bed as where the outer had been originally placed.  This opened a crack through which a small stream of water must constantly pour, each hour rendering the leak more dangerous by loosening the oakum, and raising the plank from its curvature.  Once discovered, however, nothing was easier than to repair the damage.  It remained merely to butt-bolt anew the wood-end, drive a few spikes, cork, and replace the copper.  Roswell, who was getting each moment more and more impatient to sail, was much vexed at a delay that really seemed unavoidable, as it arose from the particular position of the leak.  Placed as it was, in a manner, between wind and water, it was not possible to work at it more than an hour each tide; and the staging permitted but two hands to be busy at the same time.  As a consequence of these embarrassments, no less than six tides came in and went out, before the stem was pronounced tight again.  The schooner was then pumped out, and the vessel was once more taken into deep water.  This time it was found that the patience and industry of our sealers were rewarded with success; no leak of any account existing.

“She’s as tight as a bottle with a sealed cork, Gar’ner,” cried Daggett, a few hours after his craft was at her anchor, meeting his brother-master at his own gangway, and shaking hands with him cordially.  “I owe much of this to you, as all on the Vineyard shall know, if we ever get home ag’in.”

“I am rejoiced that it turns out so, Captain Daggett,” was Roswell’s reply; “for to own the truth to you, the fortnight we have lost, or shall lose, before we get you stowed and ready to sail again, has made a great change in our weather.  The days are shortening with frightful rapidity, and the great bay was actually covered with a skim of ice this very morning.  The wind has sent in a sea that has broke it up; but look about you, in the cove here—­a boy might walk on that ice near the rocks.”