together. Such a struggle for life, however, leaves no time for regretting lost companions. Every moment that Christmas tried to raise his head a little above the waves to see if anywhere he could descry unhappy Nat, he was so beaten and buffeted and flung about and fallen upon, that all his attention had to go back at once to himself alone. At one moment, however, he saw that he was very near the upturned boat. A thrill of hope and joy went through him. It was not easy to get to the boat without the chance of being dashed against her or sucked under her, and Christmas dreaded almost above all things a disabled hand or arm just now. Nor was it easy being near the boat to do anything better than allow himself to be dashed against her and take his chance. So he made for her anyhow, and presently he was flung forward and felt a sensation as if some giant had flung him up against a wooden gate, and uncertain whether his ribs were dashed in or not he found himself lying across the upturned boat and clinging to her keel. This was the moment for safety. It was at all events a relief not to keep his limbs and senses employed in the mere struggle to remain afloat. He was afloat now easily enough, and the only thing was to keep himself from being smothered by waves breaking against the boat, or from being torn away from her, or having his head beaten against her keel. "Luckily there are no sharks about here," our poor hero thought.

Far away he saw the sail of which Nat Cramp had spoken. The wind, however, blew from her to him, and he did not believe there would be the slightest chance of sending his voice across the gusts to her. So he prudently spared his lungs, and did not try. It was raining and the sky was all clouds, and he did not think he could do anything to make her see him. Still he had great hopes from her, and while that sail remained above his horizon he felt that no chilling sea could cause him to give up the struggle. For he seemed to have made up his mind that the sea should not swallow him before he had given his last message to Marie Challoner. "Die here now," he thought, "and she never to know how I loved her? NoI'll not die! I'll never give in! I'll get to Durewoods yet!"

It was strange how queer and drowsy and dreamy he seemed to grow. He was lying now not very uneasily along the back of the boat and holding on to her keel and was nearly out of the water, and there was a warmish and thick drizzle of rain falling around him, and the tossing motion and the hoarse roaring of the waves seemed to dull all his

senses.

The sharper tension of the struggle was gone and his frame was relaxed, and he felt inclined to go to sleep. He seemed to himself less like one clinging for dear life to an upturned boat in an angry sea than like one who lies in his bed and

dreams of being in such a plight. But that the light had not changed he would have thought he must have been hours in the water. It seemed half a lifetime since he left London in the pouring rain that very morning. Was it that morning or when? Had he really met Nat Cramp at all?

Sometimes he found his eyes closing, and he once must have dozed for an instant, for he thought he was travelling in the sleeping-car of a railway at night, and that the noise of the waves was the rush and rattle of the train. Then he came to himself with a start, fearing he was about to be washed off the boat. Sometimes his mind wandered and he fancied he was in Japan with his father; in San Francisco; in Durewoods with Marie Challoner in the hollow among the trees holding her hand, and he talked to her quite aloud. More than once, when his tired, languid eyes closed, he fancied he was lying in the chair in Sir John Challoner's library at Kensington asleep, and he believed that he had but to open his eyes and see Marie Challoner bending over him. So he looked up and saw the grey sky and felt the tossing of the pitiless waves, and clung all the faster and with strength renewed to the slippery boat and compelled his nerves to keep under his control, for if he lost his self-discipline for even a single moment he knew full well that he should never see Marie Challoner again. These little half-unconscious moments, these fits of sleepiness, were probably his salvation. Perhaps without them his nerves could never have endured the strain put on them the strain of watching his safety and holding on to the boat.

What gleams of pleasure were extracted from the most unpromising condition, like the sunbeams from the Laputan cucumber? A chance change of position, bringing a sense of freshness and relief to the overstrained frame, to the uneasy limbs, was for the moment a delight, as it is to the sick man on a bed of pain. Then he allowed his mind to enjoy the respite for an instant, and it went off guard and stood at ease. Sometimes he found himself shouting out scraps of song in answer to the hoarse roar of the waters. Sometimes he talked to himself, and sometimes he shouted to Nat Cramp. Then he grew lazy and languid again, and felt very cold, and when his mind was awake and active enough to take in the reality of his condition he began to fear that he could not hold on any longer, that he must drop off and die, and never see Durewoods more. But again some change of position gave him fresh relief, and he presently found himself back in Durewoods among the trees talking with Marie Challoner. Then he grew so languid that even when he once became vaguely aware that the sail he had seen was much nearer to him than before he only made mental observation that it was a schooner, and did