Page:Young Hunters in Porto Rico.djvu/72

68 It was nearly eleven o'clock when the whistle died out and the boy gave a long yawn. Oh, if his trick would only come to an end! He knew that once in his bunk he would go fast asleep in less than a minute.

A few minutes more passed, and the tired boy leaned up against the brass-bound wheel. Then he straightened up and tried to whistle again. But the note died on his lips and then—he knew no more.

Bump! The shock awoke everybody on board, but no one quicker than old Jacob, who slept, as Dick expressed it, "with one eye open."

"What's the matter?" roared the Yankee tar, as he tumbled on deck, minus his shoes and the greater portion of his wearing apparel. "By gosh, Bob, ye air running her on the rocks!" and he ran with might and main for the wheel.

The shock had also aroused Bob, but the youth was too bewildered for a few seconds to do more than stare helplessly about him.

"Why—er—what—" he began, when the sight of a long line of breakers, coming over some hidden rocks dead ahead, almost paralyzed him.

He tried to throw the Dashaway over to starboard and then over to port, and the consequence of the two movements was to send the craft straight ahead as before.

"Down with the mainsail!" roared old Jacob,