e ship depended on his
promptitude. The sea was rapidly rising; and this was soon perceptible
by her uneasy motion, as she rose and fell to each receding wave, the
last always appearing of greater height than its predecessors. Any
moment it might be necessary either to keep her away, and, furling
everything, to let her drive before the gale under bare poles, or to put
her helm down and heave her to, thus to let her lie forging slowly
a-head, till the gale had abated. A few minutes only had passed since
the brig first felt the force of the gale, and the whole sky was now a
mass of dark clouds, and the sea a sheet of white driving foam--out of
which lofty waves seemed to lift their angry heads, and to urge each
other into increased violence. The wind howled and whistled through the
rigging; the spars creaked and bent; and the whole hull groaned with the
exertion as she tore onwards. Ada, who had, when the ship heeled over,
held firmly on to the weather bulwarks, gazed at the scene, to her, so
novel and grand, with intense pleasure, from which fear was soon
banished; and little Marianna, having followed the example of her
mistress in securing herself, imitated her also in her courage. Indeed,
as yet, except that they were rather wetted by the foam which came on
board, when the squall first struck the brig, there was no object of
terror to alarm them. The moment Bowse could withdraw his attention
from the care of the ship, he hurried to assist Ada and her attendant,
and to place them on the seat which surrounded the cabin skylight, where
she might enjoy the magnificent spectacle of the tumultuous ocean,
without the fatigue of standing, and having to hold on by the bulwarks.
A cloak was thrown round her feet, and as she reclined back in the seat,
she declared she felt like an ocean queen in her barge of state,
reviewing her watery realms. The colonel's appearance on deck,
supported by his man Mitchell, whose usual cadaverous countenance looked
still more ghastly, drove away the romance in which she was beginning to
indulge. He scolded her roundly for venturing on deck without his
escort, and insisted on her promising never to do so again, on pain of
being compelled instantly to go below.

The mate had returned to his post. The brig behaved beautifully; though
she heeled over to the force of the wind, she rose buoyantly to each
mountain wave, which reared its crest before her, and though the light
spray which the sh