ful pounding on the forecastle-head with a
handspike, and the accompanying cry of--

"Hillo there, sleepers; tumble up. All hands shorten sail! Hurry up,
my bullies, or we shall have the squall upon us before we are ready for
it."

The response to this summons was almost instantaneous, and in two or
three minutes the whole crew were at work, under the orders of Mr
Roberts, who had heard, even in his sleep, the distant cry of "All
hands," and had tumbled out without waiting for a more formal summons.
This man I now found to be excellent in such an emergency as the
present; calm, cool, and collected; not hurrying anybody, yet, as it
were, infusing his own energy and vitality into the men by the sharp,
incisive tones of his voice, and putting quicksilver into them by--as it
seemed--the mere exercise of his will. Under such masterful supervision
the work progressed rapidly, and in something over half an hour we had
the ship under her fore and main-topsails (which were patent-reefing)
and the fore-topmast staysail; every other thread being snugly furled,
and the men once more down on deck. The watch was then sent below again
for the short time remaining to them, and I composed myself comfortably
in a capacious wicker chair to abide the issue of events.

The sky had by this time become entirely overcast, from horizon to
horizon, and so intensely dark was it that I was literally unable to see
my hand when I raised it before my eyes, by way of experiment; and, but
for the dim radiance gleaming through the skylight from the turned-down
lamp in the saloon, the faint gleam of light from the binnacle
illumining feebly and in a ghostlike manner the head and shoulders of
the man who lounged beside the useless wheel, and the pale fires
flashing from the water that washed to and fro athwart the deck with the
roll of the ship, it would have been utterly impossible to have moved
from spot to spot save by the aid of one's memory of the various
localities about the ship.

A period of perhaps twenty minutes had elapsed since the retirement of
the watch below at the conclusion of their labours, and I had stolen on
tiptoe to the skylight--doubtless influenced to this stealthy mode of
progression by the profound silence of the night--for the purpose of
again consulting the barometer that swung therein, when I felt a heavy
drop of tepid water fall upon my face. This was followed by another,
and another, and another; and then, with the