erous merchant vessels
and smaller craft had also from time to time been dashed to pieces on
the rocks, and many sad tales there were of lives being lost, when the
persons on board the vessels appeared within but a short distance of the
shore.

Nora had sufficiently recovered to go to the window and gaze forth upon
the vessel.

"O, what a beautiful fabric she is," she exclaimed; "how rapidly she
draws near!" With the glass she could almost see those on board. "But
will she, do you think, escape that reef to the north, when she once
more tacks."

"Oh, yes, I trust so," answered Lady Sophy, "he who commands on board is
an experienced seaman, you know, and if any human being could carry the
ship out of the bay, he will do so."

Besides the young ladies, several other persons on shore were watching
the progress of the corvette, as she endeavoured to beat out of the bay.
Far down below, in the sheltered cove, in front of her cottage, stood
Widow O'Neil. Her white locks, escaping from the band which generally
bound them, streamed in the wind. The hood of her red cloak was thrown
back, and while with one hand she steadied herself by one of the
supports of the deep eaves of the cottage, she stretched forth the other
towards the ocean, as if she would direct the course of the bark which
struggled through the foaming waves.

"They are brave men on board that craft," she exclaimed to herself, "but
oh, it is hard work they will have, to get clear of the bay. Proud and
trim as that beautiful ship looked this morning, who can say but what
before another sun rises, she will be a shattered wreck upon yonder
cruel rocks. Such a sight I have seen night after night as I lay on my
couch, I know not whether asleep or awake; but, oh, may Heaven protect
those on board from such a fate, if their vessel, stout as she may be,
is thrown upon yonder reef.

"My boy, my boy! Even now he may be on the stormy ocean, threatened
with shipwreck, as are those in yonder beautiful vessel. May Heaven
protect him and them!"

As she spoke, the fishwife stretched forth her neck more eagerly over
the ocean, and again and again she offered up a prayer for the safety of
those on board the ship which struggled below her. High up the glen, in
a sheltered place, yet still commanding a view of the bay, sat another
person. It was Father O'Rourke. He, too, was watching the ship, with a
very different feeling animating his heart, to that which worked