It was, however, more than possible that we should be picked up very soon by some passing ship. It was not as though we were down away in the South Pacific, or knocking about in the poisonous Gulf of Guinea, or up in the North Atlantic at 60°. We were on a great ocean highway, crossed and re-crossed by English, American, Dutch, and French ships, to and from all parts of the world; and bad indeed would our fortune be, and baleful the star under which we sailed, if we were not overhauled in a short time and assistance rendered us. A great though unexpressed ambition of mine was to save the ship and navigate her myself, not necessarily to England, but to some port whence I could communicate with her owners and ask for instructions. As I have elsewhere admitted, I was entirely dependent on my profession, my father having been a retired army surgeon, who had died extremely poor, leaving me at the age of twelve an orphan, with no other friend in the world than the vicar of the parish we dwelt in, who generously sent me to school for two years at his own expense, and then, after sounding my inclinations, apprenticed me to the sea. Under such circumstances, therefore, it would be highly advantageous to my interests to save the ship, since my doing so would prefer some definite claims upon the attention of the owners, or perhaps excite the notice of another firm more generous in their dealings with their servants, and of a higher commercial standing. Whilst I stood dreaming in this manner at the wheel, allowing my thoughts to run on until I pictured myself the commander of a fine ship, and ending in allowing my mind to become engrossed with thoughts of Mary Robertson, whom I believed I should never see again after we had bidden each other farewell on shore, and who would soon forget the young second mate, whom destiny had thrown her with for a little time of trouble and suffering and death, I beheld a figure advance along the poop, and on its approach I perceived the boatswain. "I've been sounding the well, Mr. Royle," said he. "I roused up on a sudden and went and did it, as I woke up anxious; and there's bad news, sir, twelve inches o' water." "Twelve inches!" I cried. "It's true enough. I found the bull's-eye on the cuddy table, and the rod don't tell no lies when it's properly used." "The pumps suck at four inches, don't they?" "Yes, sir." "Then that's a rise of eight inches since half-past nine o'clock. What time is it now?" "Twenty minutes arter ten." "We must man the pumps at once. Call Cornish. You'll find the steward on a mattress against the companion ladder." He paused a moment to look round him at the weather, and then went away. I could not doubt now that the ship was leaky, and after what we had endured, and my fond expectation of saving the vessel--and the miserable death, after all our hopes, that might be in store for us--I felt that it was very very hard on us, and I yielded to a fit of despair.