Noon
The men -- thanks to good feeding and all the rest I could give them consistent with the maintenance of proper discipline -- had by this time completely recovered from the effects of our boat voyage , and were one and all as keen as needles on the lookout for the boats from the moment that we squared away , the watch , all but the helmsman , taking to the rigging -- without any orders from me -- immediately that they had finished breakfast , and disposing themselves upon the royal and topgallant yards in their eagerness to catch the earliest possible glimpse of their shipmates . I calculated that at about five bells in the forenoon watch we ought to overtake the dinghy , -- the slowest boat in the fleet , -- and as that moment drew near our anxiety reached a most painful pitch , the men on the yards straining their eyes to the utmost as they peered intently into the distance from right ahead to broad on either beam , carefully and slowly scanning the horizon for the little blot of gleaming canvas that should proclaim the success of our quest . But the fateful moment came and went , leaving the horizon a blank . Noon arrived , and I secured an excellent observation for my latitude , by means of which I was enabled to check my previous dead reckoning , which tallied to within less than a mile of what it ought to be ; and still there was no sign of the missing boat , although my calculations showed that we had overrun by some fifteen miles the spot where we expected to find her . I hailed the yards , inquiring whether there was any possibility of our having run past the dinghy without observing her ; but the men assured me that they had maintained so bright a lookout that had she been anywhere within the boundaries of our horizon they would assuredly have seen her . This was rather disconcerting , yet I felt that I had no real cause for disappointment ; the boats might have met with rather fresher winds than I had estimated for , in which case the likelihood was that they were still many miles ahead of us . My calculations had been based upon the supposition that they had been evenly maintaining the same rate of speed from the moment when we parted with them , and I knew that this was in the last degree improbable .