en they would so spin it out, that the telling would
occupy almost as many hours as you were days on the voyage. Nothing like
condensing the agony and expanding the joy in a yarn, it makes the
listeners in a better mode, and more sociable with each other."

"Sociability," said Alec, "among seafaring men is pretty general. It is
usually 'Hail, fellow, well met!' with us, for we endeavour to get all
the fun we can out of life, because we know that whenever he gets the
chance, Death will have his gibe at us. A sailor must, of necessity,
often face death, and therefore his motto is, 'Eat, drink, and be merry,
for to-morrow we die'; and death does come to him frequently when least
he expects it. I'll tell you an instance of this in which I and some of
my relatives were concerned.

"Nine miles from the shore of my native village there is a most
dreadful sand-bank, in the form of the letter U, which at low tide is
frequently bare, while at high tide not more than two fathoms of water
cover it. It has been a death-trap to many a stout vessel, and at the
time I am speaking of had nothing near it in the form of a lighthouse,
lightship, or even a buoy to mark its dread presence. At daybreak on a
rough November morning the look-out on duty discovered that a small
trading schooner was fast on the sands, and after the usual half-hour's
excitement in the village the surf boat, containing eleven men, was
launched and proceeded to the wreck. There was quite a little party of
my family aboard, as beside myself, the crew also contained my father,
brother, and two cousins.

"To make a long story short, I will simply say, that after a three
hours' exhausting pull we reached the vessel, but were grieved to find
that of the crew of six hands, only one was left alive. Our attention
was therefore turned to the saving of this poor sailor, who had lashed
himself to the bowsprit, where he had sat all through the cold night,
and was so benumbed that he could scarcely speak. We shouted to him, and
made him understand that if he would cut his lashings, we would when
opportunity served, pull the boat under the bowsprit so that as we
glided by he might drop in and be saved. His knife was quickly at work,
and to show that he was free he held up his hands and moved himself on
the bowsprit. We gave him a cheer, and watching our best time, glided in
on the crest of a wave to deliver the poor fellow. Alas! in his
excitement he jumped too soon, and dropped