, lay
bare for many feet, though often washed by the waves that came sweeping
along her length, green and angrily, still capped, as usual, with crests
of lucid foam. The shocks, as the vessel tilted against the billows, were
becoming every moment more severe; and, from each encounter, a bright
cloud of spray arose, which either fell glittering on the deck, or drove,
in brilliant mist, across the rolling water, far to leeward.

Wilder long watched the ship, with an excited mien, but with all the
intelligence of a seaman. Once or twice, when she trembled, and appeared
to stop, in her violent encounter with a wave, as suddenly as though she
had struck a rock, his lips severed, and he was about to give the order to
reduce the sail; but a glance at the misty looking image on the western
horizon seemed ever to cause his mind to change its purpose. Like a
desperate adventurer, who had cast his fortunes on some hazardous
experiment, he appeared to await the issue with a resolution that was as
haughty as it was unconquerable.

"That topmast is bending like a whip," muttered the careful Earing, at
his elbow.

"Let it go; we have spare spars to put in its place," was the answer.

"I have always found the 'Caroline' leaky after she has been strained by
driving her against the sea."

"We have our pumps."

"True, sir; but, in my poor judgment, it is idle to think of outsailing a
craft that the devil commands if he does not altogether handle it."

"One will never know that, Mr Earing, till he tries."

"We gave the Dutchman a chance of that sort; and, I must say, we not only
had the most canvas spread, but much the best of the wind: And what good
did it all do? there he lay, under his three topsails driver, and jib; and
we, with studding sails alow and aloft, couldn't alter his bearing a
foot."

"The Dutchman is never seen in a northern latitude."

"Well, I cannot say he is," returned Earing, in a sort of compelled
resignation; "but he who has put that flyer off the Cape may have found
the cruise so profitable, as to wish to send another ship into these
seas."

Wilder made no reply. He had either humoured the superstitious
apprehension of his mate enough, or his mind was too intent on its
principal object, to dwell longer on a foreign subject.

Notwithstanding the seas that met her advance, in such quick succession as
greatly to retard her progress the Bristol trader had soon toiled her way
through a league of the troubl