Buoyed

Still as he had been accustomed to swim merely in rivers he only buoyed himself up with difficulty, and his distress was great when fortunately necessity taught him what course he should adopt; he darted forward between two of the cows, grasped a horn of each of them and was then carried along as securely and naturally as if he had been riding in his own wain.

Thus buoyed up, he floated on the waves like a merman, or like an angler's dobber, until he landed safely on a rock, where he was found the next morning busily drying his many breeches in the sunshine.