the two, explained to them that the lights were termed,
by the Portuguese navigators, "Lights of Saint Elmo"; and he assured the
lads that the lights were not the cause of, but the harbingers of,
storm.

"I fear, however," added he, "that we are in for a bad time of it, and
you youngsters had better beware lest you be swept overboard when the
sea rises; for if anyone is washed over the side during what is coming
he will have no chance of being picked up again. So take care, young
men!"

Suddenly Roger perceived, far away to the north, a line of white, which
looked like a thin streak of paint drawn across an ebony background, and
the dull moaning noise in the air quickly grew in volume, at the same
time becoming more shrill. Roger shouted down a warning to Leigh, who
was standing near the wheel, and pointed away in the direction from
which the line of white was approaching. Cavendish, who had just walked
forward to make sure that all was as it should be, heard the warning,
and shouted an order for all on deck to prepare for the outfly, and
then, seizing his speaking-trumpet, rushed up on the poop beside the
boys, and roared out a warning to the only ship within hail. Then,
turning, he told the two lads to get down off the poop on to the
main-deck, where they would be sheltered to a certain extent by the high
bulwarks of the ship. In obedience to this command they hurried down
the starboard accommodation ladder, whilst Cavendish made his way down
the one on the port side, and all three reached the deck together.

Cavendish then shouted some order to Leigh at the wheel, but whatever it
may have been, his words were drowned by the awful shriek and roar of
the hurricane as it burst upon them.

To Harry and Roger, who had never experienced anything of the kind
before, it seemed as though some mighty invisible hand had smitten the
ship, throwing her over on to her beam-ends. She heeled down before the
blast until it seemed as though she would capsize altogether, while the
two boys were precipitated both together across the streaming decks into
the lee scuppers, whence they found it impossible to escape owing to the
excessive slant of the deck.

Leigh was hanging on to the wheel for his life, endeavouring to put the
helm hard up, and so turn the ship's stern to the wind to enable her to
run before the gale--the only course possible under the circumstances.

Cavendish and a few men in the fore-part of the vessel were