Page:Paine--Lost ships and lonely seas.djvu/439

Rh from the water; a barrel of wine, half a barrel of molasses, several useful articles towards building a tent; besides which they had firearms and shot, a pot for boiling, and most probably other things not mentioned."

Ephraim How, Mr. Augur, and the cabin boy prepared to make a winter of it in their flimsy shelter of a canvas tent amid the rocks and snow-drifts. They shot crows, ravens, and sea-gulls, and warded off starvation with an uncomplaining heroism which expressed itself in these words:

"Once they lived five days without any sustenance but did not feel themselves pinched with hunger at other times, which they esteemed a special favor of heaven unto them."

The dear friend and companion, Mr. Augur, died after three months of this ordeal, and the cabin boy lived until the middle of February. Thereafter Ephraim How was a solitary castaway. He somehow survived the winter, and notched a stick to keep the tally of the days and weeks as they brought the milder airs of spring. Fishing-vessels may have sighted his signals, but they passed unheeding, afraid of some Indian stratagem to lure them inshore.

Ephraim How had been three months alone, and seven months on this island near Cape Sable, when