is a
barrel of powder.

Of course the crew of the _Pandora_ did not stand idle or inactive.
They ran in every direction in search of means to extinguish the fire.
Buckets were collected from all parts of the deck, and water was
procured from pumps and over the sides. This was heaved down the
hatchway of the store-room--bucketful after bucketful--but apparently
without any good purpose. Still the flames raged and the water did not
reach them; at all events, it failed to extinguish them.

Of course no one dared venture below. The smoke and fire forbade it--
any attempt to go down would have been a rash sacrifice of life, and no
one thought of making it.

For nearly ten minutes the men continued to draw water, and dash it in
bucketsful down the hatchway; but all to no purpose. The fire gained
strength. The smoke grew thicker and hotter, from the pitch and other
combustible substances that had now evidently caught the flames. It
poured up in vast volumes till the cabin became filled. It was no
longer possible to approach the hatchway, no longer possible even to
enter the cabin. One or two who ventured in were half-stifled before
they had gone six feet inside, and came reeling back like men who were
drunk!

The buckets were thrown aside. They could no longer be of service--as
no one could get near the hatchway to pass water down it, and it was of
no use throwing it elsewhere.

But the hour of despair had not yet arrived. Sailors are men who rarely
yield to despair; at all events not while the slightest chance remains
to beget hope; and, bad as may have been their moral character, the crew
of the _Pandora_ were not cowards. Linked with a thousand crimes they
had the one virtue of courage--though brute courage it may have been.

Not yet did they despair. Other resources were now thought of. A piece
of hose was attached to the spout of the pump, and carried to the door
of the cabin; and by means of this water was still poured in.

But this contrivance proved unavailing. The mouth of the hose could not
be got into the hatch, as it was impossible any longer to enter the
cabin, and the water was spilled on the floor. It so chanced that the
stern of the vessel sat high. The casks that had been emptied were all
in the after-hold, while the full ones containing the sea-water were
stowed forward. Hence the barque was higher abaft than at the bows.
For this reason the water thrown upon the cabin floor by means