nd never rose from it more, after giving birth
to these two little girls, leaving poor Sam and Arthur to struggle on
like a cutter in a heavy sea. But God Almighty never deserts the
innocent, sir--you've seen that, I dare say? Sam's been a steady lad,
and has prospered, and he and Arthur have never forgotten their mother's
dying words, and have been very kind to their sisters; but, come what
will, the orphans shall never want a friend as long as Charley Helston
has a home or a bit of bread to offer them."

We now again reverted to the state of the day. As the gale swept on,
numberless craft were running along the coast towards ---- port, for
shelter. A crack Fowey-man now making a board till she "eat out" of the
wind a North-countryman right ahead--now with her helm-a-lea, and now
careering along with a heavy following sea on either quarter--kept our
attention on the alert. Presently a steamer came in sight bearing up
across the bay towards ---- Head. The white rush of steam from her
safety-valves was well made out by the blackness of the windward
horizon; and contrasted with the dense puffs of smoke from her funnel,
which were instantly dispersed or carried in heavy patches to leeward.
The glory of modern discoveries is unpopular with our coasting-seamen,
and the mate of a coaster, who was watching her movements, observed that
"we should not have a lad fit to hand a sail or man a yard soon with
their cursed machinery."

As she passed on her course "cleaving blast and breaker right ahead,"
with her weather-wheel often spinning in the air, and as the sky
darkened and the waves roared louder, I thought with deep interest on
what might even now be the fate of those, without whose friendly aid I
should have been lying on a rocky pillow and seaweed for my shroud, near
Dawlish's Hole. The weather now became entitled to the formidable name
of a storm, but some time had yet to elapse before darkness added its
horrors to the scene of desolation.

Heavy masses of breakers were continually striking the pier-head with
fearful crashes; now bursting over, amid seas of spray, with resistless
impetuosity, drenching every one under its lee; now recoiling for a
brief moment, as if to gather strength, leaving a smooth, hollow waste
of oily sea--like the treacherous pauses of human passion,--and then
returning with wilder haste and tenfold added fury to the onset.

The morning was waning away. I left the pier, and bent my course away
f