oing to blow."

Indeed the whole sky was now beginning to take on a very threatening
look. The black line to the eastward grew blacker as it came nearer and
nearer. A low, rumbly, whispering noise went moaning over the sea. The
water which had been so blue and smiling turned to a ruffled ugly
gray. And across the darkening sky, shreds of cloud swept like tattered
witches flying from the storm.

I must confess I was frightened. You see I had only so far seen the
sea in friendly moods: sometimes quiet and lazy; sometimes laughing,
venturesome and reckless; sometimes brooding and poetic, when moonbeams
turned her ripples into silver threads and dreaming snowy night-clouds
piled up fairy-castles in the sky. But as yet I had not known, or even
guessed at, the terrible strength of the Sea's wild anger.

When that storm finally struck us we leaned right over flatly on our
side, as though some in-visible giant had slapped the poor Curlew on the
cheek.

After that things happened so thick and so fast that what with the wind
that stopped your breath, the driving, blinding water, the deafening
noise and the rest, I haven't a very clear idea of how our shipwreck
came about.

I remember seeing the sails, which we were now trying to roll up upon
the deck, torn out of our hands by the wind and go overboard like a
penny balloon--very nearly carrying Chee-Chee with them. And I have a
dim recollection of Polynesia screeching somewhere for one of us to go
downstairs and close the port-holes.

In spite of our masts being bare of sail we were now scudding along to
the southward at a great pace. But every once in a while huge gray-black
waves would arise from under the ship's side like nightmare monsters,
swell and climb, then crash down upon us, pressing us into the sea; and
the poor Curlew would come to a standstill, half under water, like a
gasping, drowning pig.

While I was clambering along towards the wheel to see the Doctor,
clinging like a leech with hands and legs to the rails lest I be blown
overboard, one of these tremendous seas tore loose my hold, filled my
throat with water and swept me like a cork the full length of the deck.
My head struck a door with an awful bang. And then I fainted.

THE FOURTH CHAPTER. WRECKED!

WHEN I awoke I was very hazy in my head. The sky was blue and the sea
was calm. At first I thought that I must have fallen asleep in the sun
on the deck of the Curlew. And thinking that I would be