rs.
But there is One who holds the winds in His fist and the sea in the
hollow of His hand, and once again by His mercy not a man was missing,
and again rose the lifeboat, and gasping and half-blinded, they saw
that the ropes along which the captain was coming were twisted one
across the other, and that, though he had escaped the full force of the
great wave, the captain of the Leda was hanging by one hand, and on the
point of dropping into the wild turmoil beneath, exhausted. Another
second would have been too late, when, quick as lightning, the
lifeboatman, G. Philpot, still being lashed to the mast, by a dexterous
jerk, chucked one of the ropes under the leg of the clinging and
exhausted man, and then, once again, they cried, 'Come along! Now's
your time!' And on he came; but as the ropes again slacked as the
lifeboat rose, fell into the sea, though still grasping the lines,
while strong and generous hands dragged him safe into the lifeboat--the
last man. All saved! And now for home!

They did not dare to haul up to their anchor, had that been possible,
lest before they got sail on the lifeboat to drag her away from the
wreck she should be carried back against the wreck, or under her bows,
when all would have perished. So the coxswains wisely decided to set
the foresail, and then when all was ready, the men all working
splendidly together, 'Out axe, lads! and cut the cable!' Away to the
right or starboard faintly loomed the land, five long miles distant.
Between them and it raged a mile of breakers throwing up their spiky
foaming crests, while their regular lines of advance were every now and
then crossed by a galloping breaking billow coming mysteriously and yet
furiously from another direction altogether, the result being a
collision of waters and pillars and spouts of foam shot up into the
air. Through this broken water they had to go--there was no other way
home, and 'there are no back doors at sea.' So down came the keen axe,
and the last strand of the cable was cut.

Then they hoisted just a corner of the foresail, to cast her head
towards the land and away from the wreck--more they dared not hoist,
lest they should capsize in such broken water, the wind still blowing
very hard. As her head paid off, a big sea was seen coming high above
the others. 'Haul down the foresail, quick!' was the cry; but it was
too late, and the monstrous sea struck the bows and burst into the
sail, filling and overpoweri