get on but slowly with our work. I was
on the after-part of the deck, when I remember seeing the gentleman I
have spoken of come up and make an offer to the captain to lend a hand
at whatever might be required to be done. I observed at the time that
he had a small case hanging to his side. He did not seem to think that
there was any danger of the ship going down for many hours to come; nor
indeed did any one; for the leaks were gaining but little on the pumps,
although they were gaining. He seemed so well to understand what he was
about that I suspected he was a naval officer. We worked away hard, and
it was nearly morning, when a dreadful peal of thunder, such as I had
never heard before, broke over our heads, and it's my belief that a bolt
passed right through the ship. Be that as it may, a fearful cry arose
that she was going down. The people rushed to the boats. Discipline
was at an end. The gentleman I spoke of shouted to the men, trying to
bring them back to their duty. Then I saw him, when all hope of doing
so had gone, hurry into the cuddy. Directly afterwards he came out with
his wife and child, together with the nurse. Supposing, I fancy, that
the boats were already full, or would be swamped alongside, he secured
the nurse to the raft we had been building, and had given her the child
to hold, calling on me and others to assist in launching it overboard,
intending to take his place with his wife upon it. He was in the act of
securing her--so it seemed to me--when the ship gave a fearful plunge
forward, and a roaring sea swept over her. I at once saw that she would
never rise again. On came the foaming waters, carrying all before them.
Whether or not the gentleman and his wife succeeded in getting to the
raft, I could not tell; there was no room, I knew, for me on it. Just
before I had caught sight of one of the boats, which had shoved off with
comparatively few people in her, dropping close under the ship's
quarter. I sprang aft, and, leaping overboard, struck out towards her,
managing to get hold of her bow as it dipped into the sea. I hauled
myself on board. By the time I had got in, and could look about me, I
saw the stern of the ship sinking beneath a wave, and for a moment I
thought the boat would have been drawn down with her. Such fearful
shrieks and cries as I never wish to hear again rose from amid the
foaming sea, followed by a perfect and scarcely less terrible silence.
We had but t