lf his little refuge. They rush forward and disappear within the
circle of gloom below the light, and the next instant he hears them
hissing and shrieking around the sturdy iron leg.

There! There is the monster wave of all, heaving its mighty crest
twenty-five feet, so that the keeper sees it level with his eyes as he
gazes, fascinated. It is coming, it is coming. Ah, it is too big to pass
the reef without breaking. See! It has toppled over, and goes boiling
under the gallery in a wild mass of ghostly foam. The keeper shivers a
little, shakes his head, and goes back to his warm room, muttering a
prayer for the safety of the sailors on the sea. You and I would mutter
one for our own, perhaps, if we stood on a swaying balcony above a
storm-torn ocean.

Before morning the keeper hears the report of a gun. He knows too well
the meaning of that sound. It is a signal of distress. He rushes out on
the balcony again, and sees the dim form of a dismasted ship driving
upon the reef. What can he do? Not a thing. He calls up his assistants,
and they helplessly watch the vessel strike. They hear the cries of her
people. They see the waves burst over her in great clouds of seething
spray. Suddenly one of the men utters a shout.

"See! There's a spar driving down on us with some one on it."

[Illustration: A RESCUE FROM THE LIGHT.]

Now the keeper and his assistants can do something, and they move with
the rapidity of men whose wits are accustomed to the emergencies of the
deep. Projecting from one side of the house is an iron arm, at the end
of which hang a block and tackle. This is used for hoisting supplies
from the boat which brings them off. Quickly a line is fastened around
the hook at the bottom of the tackle. This is to give the shipwrecked
mariner something by which to hold. The broken and half-buried spar
sweeps down toward the light-house. Two men are clinging to it with the
strength of despair. The tackle is lowered, and as the spar drives
against one of the stout iron legs of the light-house one of the two men
catches the rope, and is quickly hauled up to the gallery. At once the
tackle is lowered again, and the other man is hauled up. Half blind,
half drowned, staggering with exhaustion, they are taken into the house
where warm drinks and dry clothing revive them. Then they sit beside the
stove and tell the dreadful story of the wreck, while the howling of the
wind, the thunder of the seas, and the swaying of the ho