rs or any other scuppers, and he was going up on the promenade
deck. There was an iron railing, he said, that he could cling to all the
way.

Rollo, in the mean time, went along the passage way, bracing his arms
against the sides of it as he advanced. The ship was rolling over from
side to side so excessively that he was borne with his whole weight
first against one side of the passage way, and then against the other,
so heavily that he was every moment obliged to stop and wait until the
ship came up again before he could go on. At length he came into a small
room with several doors opening from it. In the back side of this room
was the compartment where the helmsman stood with his wheel. There were
several men in this place with the helmsman, helping him to control the
wheel. Rollo observed, too, that there were a number of large rockets
put away in a sort of frame in the coil overhead.

He went to one of the doors that was on the right-hand side of this
room, and opened it a little way; but the wind and rain came in so
violently that he thought he would go to the opposite side and try that
door. This idea proved a very fortunate one, for, being now on the
sheltered side of the ship, he could open the door and look out without
exposing himself to the fury of the storm. He gazed for a time at the
raging fury of the sea with a sentiment of profound admiration and awe.
The surface of the ocean was covered with foam, and the waves were
tossing themselves up in prodigious heaps; the crests, as fast as they
were formed, being seized and hurled away by the wind in a mass of
driving spray, which went scudding over the water like drifting snow in
a wintry storm on land.

After Rollo had looked upon this scene until he was satisfied, he shut
the door, and returned along the passage way, intending to go down and
give Jennie an account of his adventures. As he advanced toward the
little compartment where the landing was, from the stairs, he heard a
sound as of some one in distress, and on drawing near he found Hilbert
coming in perfectly drenched with sea water. He was moaning and crying
bitterly, and, as he staggered along, the water dripped from his clothes
in streams. Rollo asked him what was the matter; but he could get no
answer. Hilbert pressed on sullenly, crying and groaning as he went down
to find his father.

[Illustration]

The matter was, that, in attempting to go up on the promenade deck, he
had unfortunately ta