He must steer in that very direction.

What he was seeking was over there.
Ferragut obeyed him, and half an hour later there appeared, one after the other, two long, low boats, moving with great velocity.

They were like destroyers, but without mastheads, without smokestacks, skimming along almost on a level with the water, painted in a gray that made them seem a short distance away of the same color as the sea.

They came around on both sides of the sailboat as though they were going to crush it with the meeting of their hulls.

Various metallic cables came up from their decks and were thrown over the bitts of the schooner, fastening it to them, and forming the three vessels into a solid mass that, united, followed the slow undulation of the sea.
Ulysses examined curiously his two companions in this improvised float.
Were these the famous submarines ?...