“Faith! It might have gone harder with us if she’d come nearer. For my part I’m just thankful she didn’t run us down entirely. Those same steamers are the terrors of the Banks. I mind well the last trip I was here in the old _Walpus_. We were lying to an anchor in a fog every bit as thick as this, and minding our own business, when one of them came rushing down on us. They paid no attention to our shouting, or to our horn, and turned neither to port nor starboard; but just came on tooting their old whistle for all other folks to get out of their way. Well, sir, we were all in the act of piling over the stern into the dories when she drove past within a handshake of the end of our jib-boom, and we could see the scared faces of the people on her deck looking down at us. She was that close that the patent log towing behind her caught on our cable and parted its line. We hauled it in the next day when we hove up our anchor. No, sir! none of your steamers for me! They’re too careless and overbearing-like, and I say we’ve just had a mighty lucky escape, and should be thankful for it. Come, now, stand your watch like a good fellow, and pull for Nova Scotia, or for some decent, easy-going sailing-vessel that’ll pick us up.” So Breeze took a spell at the oars, and thus rowing by turn, and telling each other yarns of their own experience, or repeating what they had learned from others to divert their thoughts, they passed the second day in the dory. The fog had not lifted for a single moment since morning, and when darkness again shut down upon them it still infolded them in its clammy embrace. Although the night was calm, they tossed their drag overboard lest a wind should rise while they slept. Then, after eating their scanty supper of a single biscuit each, they lay down, hugging each other closely for warmth, and prepared to pass the night in such comfort as their circumstances would permit. Before they dropped asleep Breeze heard Wolfe say, as though talking to himself, “We must have made something over fifty miles to-day, and at the same rate we’ll soon reach the Nova Scotia coast now.” Breeze smiled at this too evident attempt to cheer him; for he knew, as well as Wolfe, that they had not made more than twenty or twenty-five miles at the most, and that the coast towards which they were heading was still several hundred miles from them. Three more days would finish their biscuit at the rate they had been eating them, and even now he was so hungry that he felt they might as well starve at once as to try and economize them any longer. Their fresh water was already half gone, and altogether their prospect was a very gloomy one. The night passed uneventfully, but before daylight Wolfe was awakened by an exclamation of dismay from his companion. “What is the trouble?” he inquired, sitting up stiffly. “The ball is closed,” answered Breeze. “Closed?”