d and rolled over the
white crested waves. The fog was growing denser around us, as if we had
been journeying through a swift-moving cloud. It was scudding in from the
Grand Banks, pushed by a chill gale which might first have passed over
the icy plateaux of inner Greenland.

This lasted for a long time. We were all staring ahead and seeking to
penetrate the blinding veil of vapor, and I felt more utterly strayed and
lost than ever in my life before. Our faces were running with the salt
spray that swished over the bows or flew over the quarters, to stream
down into the bilge at our feet, foul with fragments of squid and caplin
long dead. We were also beginning to listen eagerly for other sounds than
the wind hissing in the cordage, the breaking of wave-tops and the hard
thumping of the blunt bows upon the seas.

"Look out sharp, byes, I'm mistrusting'," roared old Sammy.

There were some long tense moments, ended by a shriek from Frenchy by the
foremast.

"Hard a-lee!"

The sails shook in the wind and swung in-board, and out again, with a
rattling of the little blocks. The forefoot rose high, once or twice,
with the lessened headway, and a great savage mass of rock passed
alongside, stretching out jagged spurs, like some wild beast robbed of
its prey. Frenchy, ahead, crossed himself quietly, without excitement,
and again peered into the fog.

"Close call!" I shouted to the skipper, after I had recovered my breath,
since I am not yet entirely inured to the risks these men constantly run.

"We nigh got ketched," roared back Sammy Moore. "I were mistrustin' the
tide wuz settin' inshore furder'n common. But I knows jist where I be
now, anyways."

His grim wrinkled face was unmoved, for during all his life he had been
staring death in the face and such happenings as these were but incidents
in the day's work.

"I doesn't often git mistook," he shouted, "but fer this once it looks
like the joke were on me."

The little smack continued to rise and fall over the surge. Yves, the
Frenchman, remained at his post forward, holding on to the foremast and
indifferent to the spray that was drenching him as he stared through the
fog, keenly. My attention was becoming relaxed for, after all, I was but
a passenger. Despite Sammy's close shave I maintained a well-grounded
faith in him. It was gorgeous to see him speed his boat over the
turbulent waters with an inbred skill and ease which reminded one of
seagulls buffeting the