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158 DICK SANDS, THE BOY CAPTAIN. CHAPTER XIV. Thus, after a voyage of seventy-four days, the " Pilgrim " had stranded. Mrs. Weldon and her fellow-voyagers joined in thanksgiving to thc kind Providence that had brought tbem ashore, not upon one of the solitary islands of Poly- nesia, but upon a solid continent, from almost any part of which there would be no difîiculty in getting home. The ship was totally lest She was lying in the surf a hopeless wreck, and few must be the hours that would elapse before she would bc broken up in scattered fragments ; it was impossible to save her. Notwithstanding that Dick Sands bewailed the loss of a valuable ship and her cargo to ^e owner, he had the satisfaction of knowing fhat be had been instrumental in saving what was far more precious, the lîves of the owner's wife and son. It was impossible to do mare than hazard a conjecture as to the part of ,the South American coast on which the "Pilgrim" had been cast Dîck imagined that it must be somewhere on the coast of Peru ; after sighting Easter Island, he knew that the united action of the equatorial current and the brislc wind must hâve had the effect of driving the schooner far northward, and he formed his con- clusion accordingly. Be the true position, however, what it might, it was ail important that it should be accurately ascertained as soon as possible. If it were really in Peru, he would not be long in findîng his way to one of the nameroaa ports and villages that lie along the coast