When I go away, I shall make it a positive condition that you do not leave your sister and Mrs.
Cliff, and I do not want you to begin now." A half-hour afterwards, when the captain and his party had set out, Ralph came to his sister and sat down by her.
"Do you know," said he, "what I think of Captain Horn?
I think he is a brave man, and a man who knows what to do when things turn up suddenly, but, for all that, I think he is a tyrant.

He does what he pleases, and he makes other people do what he pleases, and consults nobody." "My dear Ralph," said Edna, "if you knew how glad I am we have such a man to manage things, you would not think in that way.

A tyrant is just what we want in our situation, provided he knows what ought to be done, and I think that Captain Horn does know." "That's just like a woman," said Ralph.

"I might have expected it." During the rest of that day and the morning of the next, everybody in the camp worked hard and did what could be done to help the captain prepare for his voyage, and even Ralph, figuratively speaking, put his hand to the oar.
The boat was provisioned for a long voyage, though the captain hoped to make a short one, and at noon he announced that he would set out late that afternoon.
"It will be flood-tide, and I can get away from the coast better then than if the tide were coming in." "How glad I should be to hear you speak in that way," said Mrs.Cliff, "if we were only going with you! But to be left here seems like a death sentence all around.

You may be lost at sea while we perish on shore." "I do not expect anything of the sort!" exclaimed Edna.