n't go!' cried many an old
sailor on the beach. 'Here, hold my jacket!' said Marsh. And I verily
believe he was thinking chiefly of the preservation of his short pipe.
'Don't you hold me back! I'm a-going to try! Let go of me!' and
seizing the line which led from the rocking brig to the shore, Marsh
rushed neck deep in a moment into the surf. Swept the next instant off
his feet, on, hand over hand, he went; swayed out under her counter,
back towards the shore, still he lives! Dashed against the ship's
side, while some shout 'He's killed,' up he clambers still, hand over
hand; and as the vessel reels inwards, down, down the rope Marsh slips
into the water and the awful recoil. 'He is gone!' they cry. No! up
again! with true bull-dog tenacity, Marsh struggles. And at last,
nearly exhausted, he wins the deck amid such shouting as seldom rings
on Deal beach.

Taking breath, he first fastens a line round his waist and to a
belaying pin; and then he discovers a senseless form, Holbrooke, the
pilot, a friend of his own, who, fast dying with the cold and drenching
freezing spray, was muttering, 'The poor boy! the poor boy!'

'William!' said Marsh. 'Who are you?' was the reply. 'I'm Henry
Marsh, and I'm come to save you.' 'No, I'll be lost; I'll be lost!'
'No you won't,' said Marsh, 'I'll send you ashore on the rope.' 'No,
you'll drown me! you'll drown me!'

And then finding the poor French boy was indeed lost and swept
overboard, alone he passed the rope round the nearly insensible man,
protecting and holding him as the seas came; and finally watching when
the vessel listed in, alone he got him on the toprail of the bulwarks,
with an exertion of superhuman strength, and then, with shouts to the
people ashore, 'Are you ready?' and 'I'm a-coming!' threw Holbrooke, in
spite of himself, into the sea; and both were safely drawn ashore.

The people nearly smothered Marsh when he got ashore, but he ran home,
his clothes frozen stiff when he got in; and I have no doubt that the
'short pipe' played no insignificant part in his recovery.

Eleven years afterwards, this same Henry Marsh was dragged by a rope
from the lifeboat to the Ganges, as described in the beginning of this
chapter, through the breakers on the Goodwin Sands at midnight; and he
is now (1892), my readers will be glad to hear, alive and hearty, at
the age of seventy-five, and I rejoice to say 'looking for and hasting
unto that blessed hope, and the glori