And just then the ship rose so languidly to meet a sea, and the water

weltered so loudly in her hold, that Dick involuntarily seized the

steersman by the arm.

"By the mass!" cried Dick, as the bows of the Good Hope reappeared above

the foam, "I thought we had foundered, indeed; my heart was at my

throat."

In the waist, Greensheve, Hawksley, and the better men of both companies

were busy breaking up the deck to build a raft; and to these Dick joined

himself, working the harder to drown the memory of his predicament. But,

even as he worked, every sea that struck the poor ship, and every one of

her dull lurches, as she tumbled wallowing among the waves, recalled him

with a horrid pang to the immediate proximity of death.

Presently, looking up from his work, he saw that they were close in below

a promontory; a piece of ruinous cliff, against the base of which the sea

broke white and heavy, almost overplumbed the deck; and, above that,

again, a house appeared, crowning a down.

Inside the bay the seas ran gayly, raised the Good Hope upon their

foam-flecked shoulders, carried her beyond the control of the steersman,

and in a moment dropped her, with a great concussion, on the sand, and

began to break over her half-mast high, and roll her to and fro. Another

great wave followed, raised her again, and carried her yet farther in;

and then a third succeeded, and left her far inshore of the more

dangerous breakers, wedged upon a bank.

The Black Arrow