Their first care was to go up to the huts and examine them, with a result that could scarcely be called encouraging. The huts had been built some years—whether by the expedition which, in 1874, came thither to observe the transit of Venus, or by former parties of shipwrecked mariners, they never discovered—and were now in a state of ruin. Mosses and lichens grew plentifully upon the beams, and even on the floor; while great holes in the roof let in the wet, which lay in little slimy puddles beneath. Still, with all their drawbacks, they were decidedly better than the open beach; a very short experience of which, in that inclement climate, would certainly have killed them; and they thankfully decided to make the best of them. Accordingly, the smaller of the two huts was given up to Augusta and the boy Dick, while Mr. Meeson and the sailors took possession of the large one. Their next task was to move up their scanty belongings (the boat having first been carefully beached), and to clean out the huts and make them as habitable as possible by stretching the sails of the boat on the damp floors and covering up the holes in the roof as best they could with stones and bits of board from the bottom of the boat. The weather was, fortunately, dry, and as they all (with the exception of Mr. Meeson, who seemed to be quite prostrated) worked with a will, not excepting Master Dick—who toddled backwards and forwards after Augusta in high glee at finding himself on terra firma—and by midday everything that could be done was done. Then they made a fire of some drift-wood—for, fortunately, they had a few matches—and Augusta cooked the two fowls they had got out of the floating hen-coop as well as circumstances would allow—which, as a matter of fact, was not very well—and they had dinner, of which they all stood sadly in need.