The hold was ceiled throughout; a part, where perhaps some delicate cargo was once stored, had been lined, in addition, with inch boards; and between every beam there was a movable panel into the bilge.

Any of these, the bulkheads of the cabins, the very timbers of the hull itself, might be the place of hiding.

It was therefore necessary to demolish, as we proceeded, a great part of the ship's inner skin and fittings, and to auscultate what remained, like a doctor sounding for a lung disease.

Upon the return, from any beam or bulkhead, of a flat or doubtful sound, we must up axe and hew into the timber: a violent and--from the amount of dry rot in the wreck--a mortifying exercise.

Every night saw a deeper inroad into the bones of the Flying Scud--more beams tapped and hewn in splinters, more planking peeled away and tossed aside--and every night saw us as far as ever from the end and object of our arduous devastation.