k made its appearance.

Just then I saw a large monster rushing towards me. I thought all was
over. He turned to open his great jaws, and in another instant I should
have been devoured.

At that critical period I saw a second object dart in between me and the
shark, and attack the latter fiercely. It was Nero, and it was the last
I ever saw of my faithful friend. His timely interposition enabled me
to reach a ledge in the cliff, where I was in perfect safety, hanging by
some strong seaweed, although my feet nearly touched the water, and I
could retain my position only with the greatest difficulty.

The whole shoal were presently around me. They at first paid their
attentions to the boat and the oars, which they buffeted about till they
were driven close to the rock, at a little distance from the place where
I had found temporary safety. They left these things unharmed as soon
as they caught sight of me, and then their eagerness and violence
returned with tenfold fury. They darted towards me in a body, and I was
obliged to lift my legs, or I should have had them snapped off by one or
other of the twenty gaping jaws that were thrust over each other, in
their eagerness to make a mouthful of my limbs.

This game was carried on for some minutes of horrible anxiety to me. I
fancied that my struggles had loosened the seaweed, and that in a few
minutes it must give way, and I should then be fought for and torn to
pieces by the ravenous crew beneath. I shouted with all the strength of
my lungs to scare them away; but as if they were as well aware that I
could not escape them as I was myself, they merely left off their
violent efforts to reach my projecting legs, and forming a semicircle
round me, watched with upturned eyes, that seemed to possess a fiendish
expression that fascinated and bewildered me, the snapping of the frail
hold that supported me upon the rock.

In my despair I prayed heartily, but it was rather to commend my soul to
my Maker, than with any prospect of being rescued from so imminent and
horrible a peril. The eyes of the ravenous monsters below seemed to
mock my devotion. I felt the roots of the seaweed giving way: the
slightest struggle on my part would, I knew, only hasten my dissolution,
and I resigned myself to my fate.

In this awful moment I heard a voice calling out my name. It was Mrs
Reichardt on the cliff high above me. I answered with all the eagerness
of despair. Then there cam