Like a flash it came back to me how many weary months of toil and hope and expectancy I had spent over that darling craft; and I remembered, too, the delirious joy of launching it, and the appalling dismay that struck me when I realised that it was worse than useless to me in the inclosed lagoon.

These thoughts passed through my mind in a few seconds.
At this time we had a swim of some _ten miles_ before us, but fortunately our predicament was observed from the land, and a crowd of blacks put out in their catamarans to help us.

Some of the blacks, as I hinted before, always accompanied me down to the shore on these trips.

They never tired, I think, of seeing me handle my giant "catamaran" and the (to them) mysterious harpoon.
After the mother whale had wreaked its vengeance upon my unfortunate boat it rejoined its little one, and still continued to swim round and round it at prodigious speed, evidently in a perfect agony of concern.
Fortunately the tide was in our favour, and we were rapidly swept inshore, even when we floated listlessly on the surface of the water.

The sea was quite calm, and we had no fear of sharks, being well aware that we would keep them away by splashing in the water.
Before long, the catamarans came up with us, but although deeply grateful for Yamba's and my own safety, I was still greatly distressed at the loss of my boat.