Mr. Mayhew slowly manoeuvred his craft, while men stood on the deck below, forward, prepared to heave the bow anchors.

“Go four points over to port, Mr. Trahern,” instructed Mr. Mayhew.  “Now, back the engines—­steady!”

Jack Benson opened his mouth wide.  Then, as he saw the way the “Hudson” was backing, he suddenly called: 

“Slow speed ahead, quick, sir!”

“You said—­” began Mr. Mayhew.

Gr-r-r-r!  The stern of the gunboat dug its way into a sand ledge, lifting the stern considerably.

“Slow speed ahead!” rasped Lieutenant Commander Mayhew, sharply.

But the gunboat could not be budged.  She was stuck, stern on, fast in the sand-ledge.

“Benson!” uttered the lieutenant commander, bitterly, “I congratulate you.  You’ve succeeded in grounding a United States Naval vessel!”

CHAPTER III

“You may as well leave the bridge!”

There was so much of overwhelming censure in the naval tone that Jack’s spirit was stung to the quick.  “It’s your mistake, sir,” he retorted.  “You didn’t follow the course I advised.  You swung the ship around to port, and—­”

“Silence, now, if you please, while men are trying to get this vessel out of a scrape a boy got her into,” commanded Mr. Mayhem, sternly.

Jack flushed, then bit his tongue.  In another moment a pallor had succeeded the red in his face.

He was blamed for the disaster, and he was not really at fault.

Yet, under the rebuke he had just received, he did not feel it his place to retort further for the present.

Mr. Mayhew and Mr. Trahern conferred in low tones for a moment or two.

“You may as well leave the bridge, young man,” resumed Mr. Mayhew, turning upon the submarine boy.  “You are not likely to be of any use here.”

As Jack, burning inwardly with indignation, though managing to keep outwardly calm, descended to the deck below, he caught sight of Hal Hastings, hovering near in the rowboat.  Hal signaled to learn whether he should put in alongside to take off his chum, but Benson shook his head.

Over on the “Farnum” the yard’s owner and Eph Somers watched wonderingly.  They understood, well enough, that the new, trim-looking gunboat was in trouble, but they did not how that Jack Benson was held at fault.

Down between decks the engines of the “Hudson” were toiling hard to run the craft off out of the sand.  Then the machinery stopped.  An engineer officer came up from below.  He and Mr. Mayhew walked to the stern, while a seaman, accompanying them, heaved the lead, reading the soundings.

“We’re stuck good and fast,” remarked the engineer officer.  “We can’t drive off out of that sand for the reason that the propellers are buried in the grit.  They’ll hardly turn at all, and, when they do, they only churn the sand without driving us off.”