Several California steamers, plying between San Francisco and Panama, passed the _Susquehanna_ within hailing distance.

But to every question, the invariable reply one melancholy burden bore: "No luck!" All hands were now in despair.

Marston could neither eat nor drink.

He never even spoke the whole day, except on two occasions.

Once, when somebody heard him muttering: "He's now seventeen days in the ocean!" The second time he spoke, the words seemed to be forced out of him.
Belfast admitted, for the sake of argument, that the Projectile had fallen into the ocean, but he strongly denounced the absurd idea of its occupants being still alive.