and by degrees all their property that had been taken ashore was stowed
away on the boat.

Then finally, Jerry, whose business it seemed to be to mind the hawsers,
unfastened the rope that held the bow of the boat, still pointing with
the current, just as they had stopped.

"Tell me when!" he called out as he stood by to repeat this maneuver with
the second hawser at the stern.

The motor began to chug away cheerily.

"There's life about that sound, all right," laughed Will, who had been
impressed with the dreadful monotony and stillness of the swamp.

"Let her loose!" called Frank, at the wheel.

So they once more started toward the open sea. There were still quite a
few miles to be traversed, however, before they could set eyes on that
same open water. The river was as "crooked as a New York alderman's
record," as Jerry declared, and so it was that in order to advance five
miles in a straight line they were compelled to navigate three times that
distance on the water.

When the afternoon had waned they found a good place for a halt.

Again they cooked a royal supper. When four healthy boys are off on a
lark of this sort the subject of eating is always one of their chief
concerns, which must account for the space which it occupies in records
of cruising and camping trips.