m.
Still, I don't see as how there is anything we can do more than we are
doing. If the schooner was to spring a leak just now, and that's not
unlikely, we should be still worse off, so we may be content with things
as they are."

I admired Nol's philosophy, though I kept an anxious look-out on the
larboard bow, dreading every instant to catch a sight of the shore, past
which I knew we should have a narrow shave, even should we be fortunate
enough to escape being driven against it. The coolest man on board was
Tom Rockets. He kept walking the deck with his hands in his pockets,
ready enough, I saw, for action, but certainly not as if a fierce
hurricane was raging around him. Now and then he had to pull out his
hands to lay hold of the bulwarks as the craft gave a lively roll, or
plunged down into the trough of a sea; but as soon as she grew
comparatively steady, he began walking away as before.

On we drove. The dreaded coast did not appear. Still I could scarcely
hope that we had passed it. The wind began to shift about at last.
Grampus said that it was the termination of the hurricane. Still it
might play us a scurvy trick before it was over, and drive us on some
inhospitable shore. I began now to look for further signs of the ending
of the storm. It got round to the northward, and on we drove till we
caught sight of the coast. It was a most unwelcome sight, though, for
should the little craft once get within the power of the breakers, which
were dashing furiously against it, I could not hope that a single man on
board would escape with his life. Even Tom Rockets began to think that
the state of things was not so pleasant as it might be. I saw that he
had taken his hands out of his pockets, and was holding on with the rest
of the people. Away we drove--the threatening shore every minute
growing more and more distinct.

"What prospect is there, think you, Grampus, of the hurricane coming to
an end?" said I. For from want of anything else to be done I was
obliged to keep my tongue going.

"I thought as how it was going to break but just now, Mr Hurry," he
answered, casting his eye all round the horizon. "It seems,
howsomedever, to have breezed up again, and if it don't shift before
long, there's little chance of the schooner's living, or any of us
either for that matter, many hours more."

"We must meet our fate, then, like men, and Christians too, I hope," I
answered, looking at him. "We have don