Our last particle of food had been eaten, the last drop of water nearly exhausted. The strongest might endure for a day or two, the weakest ones must sink within a few hours. Even O'Carroll, strong as he seemed, was giving way. He sat dull and unconscious, his eyes meaningless, only arousing himself by a great effort. My brother's head rested on my arm, and I was moistening his lips with the few drops obtained from the cask. Suddenly Kelson, who had been gazing round the horizon, started up, crying out, "A breeze! a breeze! I see it coming over the water!" I turned my eyes to the west, the direction to which he pointed. There I saw a dark-blue line quickly advancing towards us. Even already, on either side, cat's-paws were to be seen just touching the surface, then vanishing again, once more to appear in a different direction as the light currents of air, precursors of the main body of the wind, touched the surface. The effect on our fainting party was magical; even the poor boys tried to lift up their languid eyes to look around. Another shout from Kelson a few minutes afterwards roused us all still more. "A sail! a sail! She's standing this way too!" Even Jacotot, who had completely given way to despair, started to his feet at the sound, and, weak though he was, performed such strange antics expressive of his joy on the little deck that I thought he would have gone overboard. "If you've got all that life in you, Mounseer, just turn to at the pump again and make some use of it, instead of jigging away like an overgrown jackanapes!" growled out Kelson, who held the poor Frenchman in great contempt for having knocked under, as he called it, so soon. Jacotot gave another skip or two, and then, seizing the pump-handle, or break, as it is called, burst into tears. The two midshipmen and boys soon relapsed into their former state, while O'Carroll seemed to forget that relief was approaching, till on a sudden the idea seized him that the stranger which was now rapidly nearing us was no other than the _Mignonne_, though she had been last seen in an opposite direction, and there had been a dead calm ever since. "Arrah! we'll all be murdered entirely by that thief of the world, La Roche, bad luck to him!" he cried out, wringing his hands. "It was an unlucky day that I ever cast eyes on his ugly face for the first time, and now he's after coming back again to pick me up in the middle of the Indian Ocean, just as a big black crow does a worm out of a turnip-field!" In vain I tried to argue him out of the absurdity of his notion. He turned sharply round on me. "It's desaving me now ye are, and that isn't the part of a true friend, Mr James Braithwaite!" he exclaimed. "Just try how he'll treat you, and then tell me how you like his company."