It was a good sign; there are great hopes of any man who is honestly dissatisfied with himself.

Folding his arms, he leaned idly on the deck-rails, and looked gravely and musingly down into the motionless water where the varied lines of the sky were clearly mirrored,--when a slight creaking, cracking sound was heard, as of some obstacle grazing against or bumping the side of the yacht.

He looked, and saw, to his surprise, a small rowing boat close under the gunwale, so close indeed that the slow motion of the tide heaved it every now and then into a jerky collision with the lower framework of the _Eulalie_--a circumstance which explained the sound which had attracted his attention.

The boat was not unoccupied--there was some one in it lying straight across the seats, with face turned upwards to the sky--and, walking noiselessly to a better post of observation, Errington's heart beat with some excitement as he recognized the long, fair, unkempt locks, and eccentric attire of the strange personage who had confronted him in the cave--the crazy little man who had called himself "Sigurd." There he was, beyond a doubt, lying flat on his back with his eyes closed.

Asleep or dead?
He might have been the latter,--his thin face was so pale and drawn,--his lips were so set and colorless.