both.
Though we could both swim, I felt assured that if we were once in the
water, there would remain very little chance of our protracting our
lives beyond a few hours.

The boat, therefore, continued to run before the wind at a rapid rate,
the slight mast creaking, and the sail stretching so tight, I expected
every minute that we should be upset. At this moment Mrs Reichardt
awoke, and her quick eye immediately took in the full extent of our
danger.

"We shall be lost," she said, hurriedly, "if we do not take in that
sail!"

I was fully aware of this, but she had seen more of a sailor's perils
than I had, and knew better how to meet them. She offered to assist me
in taking in the sail, and directing me to be very careful, we
proceeded, with the assistance of the awning, to the mast, and after a
good deal of labour, and at some risk of being blown into the sea, we
succeeded in furling the sail, and unshipping the mast.

We were now in quite as much danger from another cause--the surface of
the sea, which had been so smooth during the calm, was now so violently
agitated by the wind, that the boat kept ascending one great billow only
to descend into the trough of another. We often went down almost
perpendicularly, and the height seemed every moment increasing; and
every time we went thus plunging headlong into the boiling waters, I
thought we should be engulfed never to rise; nevertheless, the next
minute, up we ascended on the crest of some more fearful wave than any
we had hitherto encountered, and down again we plunged in the dark
unfathomable abyss that, walled in by foaming mountains of water,
appeared yawning to close over us for ever.

It was almost entirely dark; we could see only the white foam of the
wave over which we were about to pass: save this, it was black below and
black above, and impenetrable darkness all around.

Mrs Reichardt sat close to me with her hand in mine--she uttered no
exclamations of feminine terror--she was more awe-struck than
frightened. I believe that she was fully satisfied her last hour had
come, for I could hear her murmuring a prayer in which she commended her
soul to her Creator.

I cannot say that I was in any great degree alarmed--the rapid
up-and-down motion of the boat gave me a sensation of pleasure I had
never before experienced. To say the truth, I should have greatly
enjoyed being thus at the mercy of the winds and waves, in the midst of
a black and stormy