About midnight
`` Man , '' said the old engineer , as he lifted his kindly grey eyes to the second mate , `` ye 're welcome to it . I wish it were a thousand , for ye 're a grand sailor man , wi ' a big heart , and maybe ye hae some good woman waiting for ye ; and a hunner and sixty pound is no sma ' help to -- '' His voice failed , but his lips were smiling still as he gave his last sigh ; and then his head lay still in Tessa 's arms . All that day over a gently heaving sea the boat sped steadily onward before the soft breath of the dying trade wind , and when night fell Harvey and Atkins reckoned that they could not be more than twenty miles from Pikirami . About midnight , therefore , the sail was lowered , and the boat allowed to drift , as otherwise she might have run past the island in the darkness . Two of the natives were placed on the look-out for indications of the land , and the rest of the people , except Harvey , laid down and slept , for after one or two rain squalls early in the evening the night had turned out fine and dry . Poor Morrison 's body had been covered up and placed under the for ` ard thwarts ; amidships lay Atkins , who had fallen asleep with his pipe in his mouth and his head pillowed on the naked chest of one of the native sailors ; aft , in the stern sheets , Tessa and Maoni slept with their arms around each other , Tessa 's pale cheek lying upon the soft , rounded bosom of the native girl . Still further aft , on the whale-back , Harvey sat , cross-legged , contentedly smoking a stumpy clay pipe lent to him by Huka , and looking , now at the glorious , myriad-starred sky above , and now at the beautiful face just beneath him , and musing upon the events of the past few days .