A Great Raft Voyage.

“Well, there we were cruising along to the north and west of Savaii Island, keeping a sharp look-out for that missing raft, look-outs on both masts all day and night, and we burned flares. Our master—as they called a navigating lieutenant—calculated that the drift of the raft would be in the direction of Wallis Island, a French island, lying all by itself to the west. We zigzagged towards the island, and called there, but saw no signs of the raft. Our captain concluded at last that we had missed it; and that there was little or no hope for it. At Wallis Island, or Futuna, a whaleboat crew of natives came off. Captain Campion asked them to keep a good look-out for the raft, and they would be rewarded when he returned from Sydney to Samoa. We continued on to the west and called at Ovalau, in Fiji, and then on to Sydney.

“After all, those driftaways were saved. The raft was blown right down to Wallis Island, and all landed there, alive but in a very famished and exhausted state, after nineteen days at sea. It must have been the most wonderful drift of a raft in the South Seas, because all on board survived it.”