San Antonio daily light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1886-1907, 1891-02-06


For a long time neither spoke and the
tears flowed in silence from Georges eyes
for the men whose lives had been so sud-
denly stifled and beaten out of them in
that irresistible surf, and Maxwell felt
not only grief hut apprehension, for he
knew better than George on what frail
hope their own existence depended.
Aiioat in the midst of the capricious
current that flows backward, forward
around, butnev to land, ont OF the track
OF all commerce, far away from land,
without food or water, under a tropic sun,
their position was indeed critical one,
and the chances were thousand to one
that they persisted miserably of hunger
and thirst. u
Maxwell tried to look cheerful and
seem to have certainty that all would
be right, but he suffered atrociously from
The wound in his leg, which was not yet
healed, and which hung in the water.
All day long they floated and George
kept up his spirits, but toward nightfall,
seeing nc signs of ship or shore, he began
to lose heart and finally said:
"Maxwell, / don't believe We'll ever
see land again. 1t would have been bet
ter if we had been drowned like the rest"
"Never give up the ship! AS long as
there is life there's hope. It's always the
darkest just before daylight. l don't see
any lane just now, but that's no reason
there is none. Who knows where Wen
be in The morning?'
sit seems as if 1 couldn't stand this
much longer. / was thirsty before we
struck and ] am fairly parched now"
""ir...::nk of lemons and bite your
tongue" said Maxwell. 1--WE amt dead
yet, and if there amt no sharks here l
think we'd orter be satisfied with all the
rest"
"Ycu are right, Max, and I'm baby.
Do you know 1 feel sleepy, and could lie
down on this spar and go to sleep"
"Do you? I'll watch over you and see
you don't slide Off"
George laid his head on MaXwell's well
knee and instantly fell asleep, and slept
perhaps a half hour, the sweetest slumber
he had ever known, and he awoke re-
freshed and strong, and then he begged
Maxwell to lie over on him and sleep a
little, too; but Maxwell declared that it
was his hour for watch on and he wasn't
sleepy. So they fell to talking over events
in general, and George, for the first time,
told Maxwell why he had wished to go to
sea, and showed him the oiled silk bag
which hung around his neck and which
contained his treasures.
Maxwell was astounded at such tale,
and if it had been possible he would have
loved the boy more for all his sorrows.
Night was falling and a heavy dew soon
wet their thin shirts, and though this in a
tbnir fhirct II did not
add to their comfort, and they prepared
to pass a wretched night, and they saw to
their lashings and arranged so that there
would be no possibility of sliding off the
spar, even if the sea should rise.
They said but little, George because he
was thinking of the terrible experiences
of the past year, and Maxwell because he
was thinking over his whole life and look
ing forward to a speedy death.
He knew we'll that ships sometimes
passed months in these treacherous cur
rents. How much worse, then, to be adrift
on a bit of broken spar, with no food or
drink, and no hope of anything better
than to be cast on one of these desolate
clinker bound islands where there was
neither food nor water.
But Somehow both of them must have
dozed in their uncomfortable position, for
when they suddenly felt sharp jar they
both looked in surprise and fear, for up
above their heads lowered black mass
what, they could not tell in the darkness.
They were still in the water, but one
end of the spar struck, every time wave
lifted it, against some resisting substance,
and they hardly knew what to think.
Maxwell first decided that it was the hull
of some ship, but presently his dangling
feet touched a rock, and he exclaimed:
"It's an island, George, as sure as eggs
is eggsr' But how to keep from drifting
off again was the great question, and one
which it was impossible to answer. BY
and by they touched against rock that
was above water, and George seized on it
with both hands, and by changing off
when each other grew tired, they held on
until the dawning of the day, when up
above them lowered in the early sunlight
gigantic wall of clinkers and rock,
black, bleak, bare and desolate of every
thing green or alive.
The rocks seemed to rise from immeas-
urable depths, and the water was so clear
that they could see fathoms deep down
under them, and they were astonished at
the numbers and beauty of the fish dart
ing about or coming actually to the sur
face to eye these strange intruders with
curiosity.
They had by some chance drifted under
the lee ut this volcanic island, and there
they lay idly rocking on the tide. How
to get further around on either side with
out danger of drifting off again was the
question. They could not land here; there
was no foothold for any living creature,
but necessity is the mother of invention,
and they decided to try and paddle along
with their hands to reach a low point of
rocks where they could make fast at least
until they learned which way the tide set.
BY great exertion they managed to reach
this point, which was the outlying rocky