The wind was north-west, and the course of the river was about south at the place where the adventurers embarked; and it was not very difficult to make the boat go after she felt the breeze. Lon had a tolerable idea of the handling of the tiller; for he had tried his hand at it in a stolen sail in this old boat. As long as it was plain sailing, he was likely to do very well. He experimented with the sail and the helm till he got the hang of them. When a bend of the river made the course south-west, he soon learned to haul in the sheet. The wind was so light that the boat did not make more than two miles an hour, and, as long as the skipper kept the old craft in the middle of the river, there was nothing to prevent her from going, and it was not very perilous navigation. “I can handle her first-rate now,” said Lon, when the boat had been moving about half an hour. “Long before we get to the Sound, I shall know all about this business.” “It will be another thing when we get out of the river, and we have to go out to sea,” croaked Matt. “What odds does it make whether we are in the river, or on the sound? Both of them are water; and the boat will go as long as she has any wind.” “Suppose the wind comes from the wrong way: what are you going to do then?” inquired Matt. “I know how to do it then. You keep her zigzagging towards the point where you want to go.” “I have heard my father tell about some kind of a bad place which the steamboats have to go through when they go to New York: how will you get through that?” And Matt thought he had given Lon a poser this time. “That’s Hell Gate; and I don’t intend to go through that, for it’s near New York; and we can go from there in some other way.” Lon was entirely satisfied that he could take the boat as far as the dangerous place. Matt was getting tired of sailing in the night, when he could only see where the river was; and the air was cold and disagreeable. He had on his thin clothes, and was not fitted out for a sea-voyage in the night. Besides, he was sleepy; for he had not closed his eyes that night. He gaped till he was in danger of throwing his jaw out of joint. “What ails you, Matt?” asked Lon. “I have got about enough of this thing,” replied Matt, with another fearful gape. “I am tired and sleepy, and I am almost froze.” “You can go to sleep if you wish to do so,” replied Lon, who was dressed in thick clothes, and was quite comfortable in spite of the chill of the air. “I can’t go to sleep while I am shivering with the cold,” replied Matt; and his whole frame shook as he spoke. “Get into the cuddy, then, if you are cold. There was some hay in it the last time I was in the boat. You can bury yourself in it, and get warm,” said Lon, afraid that the discomfort of his companion might wreck the expedition. “I don’t want to be in that cuddy when the boat is going,” whined Matt, his teeth chattering all the time. “Suppose she should hit on a rock, and sink: what would become of me?”