lee
quarter, sweeping in a steadily increasing volume along her deck. The
catastrophe which followed took place with startling rapidity. The
stern of the barque, now buried beneath the surge, seemed at once to
lose all its buoyancy, and, powerfully depressed by the leverage of the
topsails on the masts, plunged at once deeply below the surface of the
hungrily leaping sea, the rest of the hull following so quickly that,
before the horrified spectators in the _Flying Fish's_ pilot-house fully
realised what was happening, the entire hull had disappeared, the masts,
yards, and top-hamper generally only remaining in sight a moment longer,
as though to impress upon them unmistakably the fact that a ship was
foundering before their eyes.

"Come back and close the door!" thundered Sir Reginald to Mildmay,
laying his hand upon certain valve-handles as the lieutenant sprang out
on deck, urged by some indefinite purpose of rendering help where help
was obviously no longer possible.

Mildmay stood for a moment, as one in a dream, watching the submergence
of the ill-fated _Mercury's_ jib-boom end and fore-topgallant mast-head
(the last of her spars to disappear) beneath the swirl where her hull
had just vanished, and then, dazedly, he obeyed the baronet's sharply
reiterated command.

No sooner did the door clang to than Sir Reginald rapidly threw open all
the valves of the water chambers, and the _Flying Fish_ at once began to
follow the barque to the bottom. In less than five seconds the
travellers found themselves clear of all the wild commotion raging on
the surface, and descending silently, rapidly, yet steadily deeper and
deeper into the recesses of the cool twilight which prevailed around
them, deepest blue below and an ever-darkening green above. They
quickly overtook the _Mercury_ and continued the descent almost side by
side with her, watching, with awe-struck curiosity yet overwhelming pity
and horror, the death-struggles of those who were being helplessly
dragged down with her. They observed, with a feeling of intense relief,
that the struggle for life ceased, in almost every case, in less than a
minute, the expression of horror on the dying men's faces passing away
still earlier and giving place to one of profound peace and contentment;
thus confirming, to a great extent the current belief that death by
drowning is a painless mode of dissolution.

The crew had, without exception, at the moment of the barque's