would prove a very formidable task--much too formidable and too
protracted to justify the hope that it could be accomplished before the
expected gale came; and as I considered the question, and talked it over
with Henderson and the boatswain, it seemed that if it could not be
completed beforehand, it would really be better on the whole to defer it
until after the gale had blown over; I, therefore, gave the order to
knock off work and get supper and a rest. Two minutes later the decks
were deserted, save by myself, and I was bracing myself up to keep a
lookout as best I might.

I felt bound to acknowledge to myself that our situation was very much
the reverse of satisfactory; for there we were, totally dismasted,
strained and leaking badly, our crew exhausted, and only nine of us
unwounded, the land barely twenty-five miles to leeward of us, and, to
crown all, a heavy gale springing up. Fortunately, we had been able to
make all the provision that was possible to meet the impending
struggle--for the wreck of our mainmast was now inboard, while the
lanyards of the fore-rigging had been cut away on both sides; and the
wreckage of the foremast was now under the schooner's bows, attached to
the hull by the stays only, so that it served as a floating anchor, to
which the little vessel was already riding head to wind.

I allowed the men two hours in which to rest and refresh themselves, and
then once more summoned them on deck; for upon sounding the well I found
that, although the schooner had been pumped dry before we had cried
"Spell-ho!" there was now eighteen inches of water in her; and I was
determined that this leak should be kept down by frequent spells of
pumping. It would never do to have the little hooker waterlogged while
battling for life in a gale, as there was little doubt that she would be
in the course of the next few hours.

In fact, while the men were still toiling at the pumps we got our first
real taste of it. For up to that moment the wind had been coming in a
steadily-increasing succession of scuffling gusts, each more fierce than
its predecessor, first from this quarter of the compass, and then from
that, with quite moderate breezes in between, mostly from a northerly
direction, that sometimes moderated almost to a calm. But now, after a
somewhat longer spell than usual of the moderate breeze, the wind quite
suddenly increased in force to that of a full gale, swooping down upon
us in a mad scuffle