Waterbury evening Democrat., 1892-09-12
THE CALIFORNIANS,
By JULES VERNE. Copyright 1891 by the Authors Alliance
CHAPTER x. PREPARATIONa.

aDSOluLe certainty as regards the death of her child, this was not so in the case of her husband. Might not John and his companions have survived the wreck of their ship and have taken refuge on one of the numerous islands of the Philippine, the Celebes or the Java seas? Could it not be possible that they lad been restrained of their liberty by ome native tribe and were without any means of escape? This was the hope to which Mrs. Allaire was henceforth to cling with tenacity so extraordinary as to bring about in San Diego and else where a change of opinion as regards the Dreadnaught.
 There were frequent consultations at Prospect cottage, which, rich as she now was, Molly had not been willing to leave. Capt. John had left her there on sailing away-he should find her there on his return. She resolved to make not the least change in her mode of life until her husband was once more back in San Diego. She was determined that the same simplicity should charac- terize her style of living; that she would spend nothing additional except as called for by her expeditions and her charities.
 The important task to which Hollis ter and Capt. Willis first turned their attention when in consultation with Mrs Allaire was to fix upon the course which had been followed by the Dread naught. It was necessary to establish this with the greatest exactitude possi- ble. The house of Hollister & Co. had shipped goods by this vessel to the Tol,ao rty;fh in kn 4o,,Ch of Singapore, for which port she also car ried a consignment of merchandise. Now after getting away from the Amer ican coast the probabilities were that Capt. John had passed in the neighbor- hood of the Ha"aiin archipelago or Sandwich islands. After leaving the Anson archipelago the Dreadnaught had'no doubt taken the direction of the Mariana and the Philippine islands, thence through Celebes sea and Macas- sar strait to the Java sea, which is bounded on the south by the Sunda islands, in order to reach Singapore. The strait of Molucca, which is formed by the Malay peninsula and the island of Sumatra, opens on the west into the bay of Bengal, in which, outside of the Andaman and Nicobar islands, there was no place where the wrecked crew could have found refuge. Beyond all doubt, John Allaire had not reached the bay of Bengal, for inasmuch as he had not touched at Singapore, and this was now known to be the case, it must be that he had boen unable to get be- yond the limits of the Java sea and the Sunda islanda.
 As for suppostng that the Dread naught instead of following the May lasian route had attempted to reach Calcutta by threading her way through the difficult passes of Torres strait along the north coast of the Australian continent, no good seaman would have dreamed of such thing. Capt. Willis insisted that Capt. John would never have taken such @ rash and uncalled for step as to expose his ship to the dan- gers of this route. The idea was not to be indulged for moment, and it was resolved to confine the search solely to the route already marked out as the one most likely followed by Allaire.
 The fact is that the Caroline, Celebes and Java seas are filled with thousands of islands of all sizes, and there it was that the crew of the Dreadnaught, if they had survived the wreck of their vessel, might be living on some desert isle or be held in bondage by some tribe. Having agreed upon these points | it was resolved to send an expedition tc | the Malaysian seas. Mrs. Allaire ther l made a proposition which to her minC was of greatest importance. She asked l Capt. Willis if he were inclined to take | command of the expedition.
 As the Flying Cloud had been laid III by Hollister & Co.,, Willis was on tho waiting list, and therefore, although taken unawares by this proposition O Mrs. Allaire, he didn't hesitate tC place himself at her disposal, condi toned upon the consent of MT. Hollis
 ter, who gladly accorded it, anC
 thanked Willis for accepting.
 "I'm only doing my duty" replied
 Willis, land everything in my power t.
 find the survivors of the Dreadnaugh
 shall be done. If Capt. John is alive
 "John is alive!" exclaimed Mrs. Al
 lnire, in a tone positive enough to si
 lence the most incredulous.
 Capt. Willis now began the discussion
 of several points calling for settlement
 To ship crew worthy of this expedi
 ton would not be a difficult matter | ANAO bAASAC "ebo tAiO HuSSbAOh OA eb NSooCi
 Of course for such an expedition as thi
 the Flying Cloud was in no wise suited
 It was not sailing vessel which wis . navigator would choose in order to UT
 dertalxe such O task, but steamer.
 At that moment there were lying i
 the bay of San Diego several steamer
 suitable for such an enterprise. Mrs r Allaire commissioned Capt. Willis to aC ) quire title to the swiftest one of tn
 lot and placed the necessary funds a
 his disposal. A few days suficed fo this transaction. Mrs. John Allaire bt
 came the owner of the Davitt, the nam . of which was at once changed to tn
 Molly's Hope, a most appropriate nam
 under the circumstances and one c
 good augury.
 It was a screw steamer of nine hun
 dred tons burden and constructed wit
 very commodious coal bunkers, whic would enable her to run long distance
 without recoaling. Rigged like three
 masted brig and carrying large sprea
 of canvas, her twelve-hundred-hor |.