y it comes, you and Francois
must round-in upon the mainsheet. Are you both ready?"

They replied in the affirmative, and after watching in vain for some
five minutes, a terrific sea burst over us, burying the craft--as it
seemed to me--nearly half-way up her mast, and beyond it the water was
comparatively smooth.

"In with it!" I gasped, as we came out on the other side of this liquid
hill. They gathered in the sheet as though their lives depended on it,
and at the same moment I eased off the weather tiller-rope, and gave the
craft her head. She surged up into the wind, her canvas flapping so
furiously that it threatened to shake the mast out of her; her lee-
gunwale appeared above the surface, and placing my feet against the
tiller I pressed it gradually over, helping her round while stopping her
way as little as possible; a sea rushed up and struck her on the port-
bow, sending her head well off on the other tack, the jib-sheet was
promptly hauled over, the mainsail filled, and as we hurriedly scrambled
over to the other side of the deck and secured ourselves anew with
lashings round our waists, the "Mouette" plunged forward on the larboard
tack, looking well up to windward and heading about due north.

The fixing and rigging of the pump was a work of considerable difficulty
and danger, but it was eventually done; and then Giaccomo and Francois,
placing themselves one on each side, set resolutely to work, with the
determination of not leaving off as long as a drop of water would flow
from the spout.

The clear stream which gushed out as soon as the brake was set going
showed us unmistakably that we had not begun a moment too soon, and had
we still entertained any doubt upon this point, it would have been
dispelled by the length of time it took to clear the little craft of
water. It was broad daylight when at length Giaccomo panted
triumphantly,--

"There she sucks!"

Just before sun-rise we noticed the first indications of a break in the
gale, and by eight o'clock it had so far moderated that our lee-rail was
just awash, and instead of diving through the seas, as we had been ever
since the gale struck us, the cutter managed to rise over everything but
the heaviest. It was still too wet forward to permit of taking off the
forecastle-hatch, but communication between cabin and forecastle could
be effected by means of a sliding door in the bulkhead; so Francois was
sent below with instructions to prepare a t