“Harkee, Mr. Mark; I thought this matter over in my mind, while we was aloft, and this is my idee as to what is best to be done, for a start.  There’s the dingui on the poop, in as good order as ever a boat was.  She will easily carry two on us, and, on a pinch, she might carry half a dozen.  Now, my notion is to get the dingui into the water, to put a breaker and some grub in her, and to pull, down to that bit of a reef, and have a survey of it.  I’ll take the sculls going down, and you can keep heaving the by way of finding out if there be sich a thang as a channel in that direction.  If the ship is ever to be moved by us two, it must be by going to leeward, and not by attempting to turn up ag’in wind and tide among them ’ere rocks, out here to the eastward.  No, sir; let us take the dingui, and surwey the reef, and look for our shipmates; a’ter which we can best tell what to undertake, with some little hope of succeeding.  The weather seems settled, and the sooner we are off the better.”

This proposal struck Mark’s young mind as plausible, as well as discreet.  To recover even a single man would be a great advantage, and he had lingering hopes that some of the people might yet be found on the reef.  Then Bob’s idea about getting the ship through the shoal water, by passing to leeward, in preference to making the attempt against the wind, was a sound one; and, on a little reflection, he was well enough disposed to acquiesce in it.  Accordingly, when they quitted the windlass, they both set about putting this project in execution.

The dingui was no great matter of a boat, and they had not much difficulty in getting it into the water.  First by slinging, it was swayed high enough to clear the rail, when Bob bore it over the side, and Mark lowered away.  It was found to be tight, Captain Crutchely having kept it half full of water ever since they got into the Pacific, and in other respects it was in good order.  It was even provided with a little sail, which did very well before the wind.  While Bob saw to provisioning the boat, and filling its breakers with fresh water, Mark attended to another piece of duty that he conceived to be of the last importance.  The Rancocus carried several guns, an armament prepared to repel the savages of the sandal-wood islands, and these guns were all mounted and in their places.  There were two old-fashioned sixes, and eight twelve-pound carronades.  The first made smart reports when properly loaded.  Our young mate now got the keys of the magazine, opened it, and brought forth three cartridges, with which he loaded three of the guns.  These guns he fired, with short intervals between them, in hopes that the reports would be carried to the ears of some of the missing people, and encourage them to make every effort to return.  The roar of artillery sounded strangely enough in the midst of that vast solitude; and Bob Betts, who had often been in action, declared that he was much affected by it, As no immediate result