She had been set by compass an hour before, and all that time had altered her bearings but half a point, though not a league off--a proof how light she had the wind.

The third coaster, a small felucca, too, was to the northward; but ever since the land-breeze, if breeze it could be called, had come she had been busy turning slowly up to windward, and seemed disposed either to cross the shoals closer in than the spot where the lugger lay or to enter the Golo.

Her shadowy outline was visible, though drawn against the land, moving slowly athwart the lugger's hawse, perhaps half a mile in-shore of her.

As there was a current setting out of the river, and all the vessels rode with their heads to the island, Ithuel occasionally turned his head to watch her progress, which was so slow, however, as to produce very little change.
After looking around him several minutes in silence Raoul turned his face upward, and gazed at the stars.
"You probably do not know, Ghita," he said, "the use those stars may be, and are, to us mariners.

By their aid, we are enabled to tell where we are, in the midst of the broadest oceans--to know the points of the compass, and to feel at home even when furthest removed from it.