“And we can’t tell whether this is the fore, main or mizzen,” observed Dick; “or whether she had more than two masts.  There must be some of her hull left, but it is all under water and maybe deeper than you think.”

“Yes,” said Jack musingly, “and I am very glad that we are above it and safe, even if we are on a lost island.  The tide is coming in steadily now, and there will be more surf, so I think it just as well not to be too near the reefs.”

“We might get ashore at some other point farther back, and examine this part of the coast,” suggested Percival.

“That woody point which we rounded and so came in sight of the outer bay might be a good place,” added young Smith, who seemed a boy of ideas, although he was a little fellow and younger than the others.  “We could go ashore there, I think, Jack.”

“Yes, so we might,” said Jack, as he began to row back.  “There is time now, I think.  We have not got to go right back.”

He pulled on till he reached the point of woods and then looked for a good place to land, finally finding one where there was a narrow white beach and a bank which sloped gradually up to a distance of twenty feet to a ledge whence there was another rise of about twenty feet to another grassy bank.

“This seems to be a good place,” he said, as he pulled in to the little beach.  “Here is an old stump to which we can tie the boat so that it may not drift away from us when the tide comes in if it reaches this point.”

Making the boat fast with plenty of slack to the rope in case the tide should rise high, he got out and then he and Percival ascended the first slope, helping Jesse W. between them.

There was room enough for all of them on the bank, but it did not appear to extend very far, and after taking a rest of a few minutes they set out to ascend to the next landing place where they again rested.

Here there was more room than before, but it was farther to the next stopping place, and there was still more room when that would be reached.

From this point they could see much of the inner bay, and make out the yacht at anchor, but could not see much beyond that, and Jack suggested that they go to a still higher point, and get another observation.

There were trees, big and little, and rough rocks here and there, which would aid them in making the ascent, and they kept on till they reached another good stopping place of greater extent whence they could see much more than before.

Jack and Dick helped young Jesse W. up the bank, as, otherwise, it would have been hard for the little fellow, who was under the average size for boys of his age, and he felt quite proud of being with the older boys, and said as he looked around on the water and the island and the yacht lying at anchor: 

“When I tell the other fellows that I came up here they won’t believe me.  I tell you, it is something to have two such big fellows to look after a little shrimp like me.”