FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   60   61   62   63   64   65   66   67   68   69   70   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83   84  
85   86   87   88   89   90   91   92   93   94   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   105   106   107   108   109   >>   >|  
Steward," he added in a louder key, "come, look alive here and git the cuddy to rights in shipshape fashion! By the powers, but the skipper'd be in a foine rage if he saw it all mops and brooms like this! Bear a hand, man, and be smart, and I'll send the carpenter to help you as soon as the watch is relayed." With these words he bustled on deck again, after changing his oilskin, which was all knocked to pieces, for a rough pea-jacket, and saying to Mr Meldrum that he thought the latter would be more handy, for it was blowing enough to take one's hair off! "Papa," said Kate as soon as the mate had ascended the companion, "what was that Mr McCarthy was saying when he spoke so low to you?" "Eh, my dear?" answered her father a little confusedly, with some hesitation in his voice. "Oh, only that the storm was raging violently and did not seem to lull at all yet." "Did he say that there was any danger?" "Danger, eh? no, I--I can't say. I think I'll just step up and see for myself;" and, anxious to escape this cross-examination, as well as really to judge whether the position of the ship was as precarious as the chief mate had indicated, Mr Meldrum likewise went up on to the poop, finding some trouble when he reached the top of the companion stairs, in opening the hatch. For a moment, after emerging on to the deck, all was terribly dark--as black as ink, as Mr McCarthy had said; but, the next instant, the whole awful scene was lit up by the most intense and vivid flash of lightning Mr Meldrum had ever beheld--the electric fluid being quite unaccompanied by any peal of thunder, although that might have been drowned by the continuous roar and shriek of the howling wind which appeared to have gone mad with the unbridled fury of a demon. During the brief space of time in which the zigazag stream of fire from the vault of heaven momentarily lit up the surroundings of the ship, which it did with a brightness that eclipsed the light of day, Mr Meldrum could see the vessel tumbling about amid a chaotic mass of waves, which it was no exaggeration to term mountains high, as if she were in the vortex of a whirlpool; while dense opaque black clouds hovered over her, vomiting forth wind, apparently from every quarter of the horizon, the gusts tearing at the ship with harpy-like clutches, as if they would rend her to pieces--she, like a poor human thing racked with pain, labouring and groaning, and bending this way and tha
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   60   61   62   63   64   65   66   67   68   69   70   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83   84  
85   86   87   88   89   90   91   92   93   94   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   105   106   107   108   109   >>   >|  



Top keywords:

Meldrum

 

companion

 

McCarthy

 
pieces
 

unbridled

 

continuous

 

shriek

 

howling

 
appeared
 

drowned


electric

 
instant
 

terribly

 
emerging
 

opening

 

stairs

 

moment

 
unaccompanied
 

thunder

 

beheld


intense

 
lightning
 

apparently

 

quarter

 

horizon

 

vomiting

 
opaque
 

clouds

 
hovered
 

tearing


labouring

 

groaning

 

bending

 

racked

 
clutches
 
whirlpool
 
vortex
 

momentarily

 

heaven

 

surroundings


brightness

 

eclipsed

 
zigazag
 

stream

 

exaggeration

 

mountains

 
tumbling
 

vessel

 

chaotic

 

During