us to join your party?"

"You are more than welcome; our boat will accommodate us all without
crowding, but I regret to say we have but a single gun among us. That
is mine, which I left with my friends against my return."

"We are well supplied in that respect; we accept your invitation with
many thanks."

As the doctor spoke he stepped down from the veranda, followed by the
others, and Mr. Anderson led the way across the lawn to the river,
where his friends were awaiting his coming with many misgivings. A
general introduction followed. A common danger makes friends of
strangers, and in a few minutes all were as well acquainted as if they
had known one another for days and weeks. Anderson and Turner were men
in middle life, while Wharton was of about the same age as Jack
Everson. They had lived for several years on the outskirts of Meerut,
but it was young Wharton who discovered the impending peril, and it was
due to him that the three families escaped the fate of hundreds of
others on that woful night. The young wife and Mary Marlowe became
intimate friends at once, while, as has been said, there was a hearty,
genuine comradeship immediately established among all.

The boat was larger than Dr. Marlowe and his companions suspected. It
was more than twenty feet in length, with a cabin at the stern, a place
for a mast, though there was neither mast nor sail on board. Anderson
had spoken of paddling to this point, when, had he spoken correctly, he
would have said that no paddles were used, but that the craft was
propelled by means of poles.