He had found a sloop! "It must be mine," he thought, "for am I not the first to see it on the beach ?" Sure enough, there it was all high and dry and painted white.

He trotted his horse around it, and finding no owner, hitched the nag to the sloop's bobstay and hauled as though he would take her home; but of course she was too heavy for one horse to move.

With my skiff, however, it was different; this he hauled some distance, and concealed behind a dune in a bunch of tall grass.

He had made up his mind, I dare say, to bring more horses and drag his bigger prize away, anyhow, and was starting off for the settlement a mile or so away for the reinforcement when I discovered myself to him, at which he seemed displeased and disappointed.

"Buenos dias, muchacho," I said.