that perhaps the dog
could swim out to the drowning men. So he signalled him off, and in
the dog went, gallantly buffeting the waves till it reached the ship.
The Russian sailors tied a piece of rope to a stick, put the stick in
the dog's mouth, and he, leaping overboard, carried it safely to
shore, and a line of communication being thus formed, every soul on
board was saved.

"They've got it in the school-books for the little children to
read," Peggotty says, permitting himself to indulge in the
slightest possible chuckle. I could not ascertain what particular
school-book was meant, because last winter, when another Russian
ship came ashore here and was totally wrecked, Peggotty presented
the captain with his only copy of the work as a souvenir of the
compulsory visit. But when we returned to the cabin, Mrs. Peggotty
brought down a faded, yellow, much-worn copy of the _Kent Herald_,
in which an account of the incident appears among other items of
the local news of the day.

Further eastward are the remains of a West Indiaman, loaded with
mahogany and turtles, the latter disappearing in a manner still a
marvel at Dungeness, whilst of the former a good deal of salvage
money was made. It is not far from this wreck that the Russian
last-mentioned came to grief. She met her fate in a peculiarly sad
manner. The _Alliance_, a tar-loaded vessel, drifting inwards before
a strong east wind, began to burn pitch barrels as a signal for
assistance. The Russian, thinking she was on fire, ran down to her
assistance, and took the ground close by. Both ships were totally
wrecked, and the crews saved with no other property save
the clothes they stood in.

Still glancing from Dungeness eastward, we see at every hundred
yards a black mass of timber, sometimes showing the full length of
a ship, oftener only a few jagged ribs marking where the carcase
lies deeply embedded. Each has its name and its history, and is a
memento of some terrible disaster in which strong ships have been
broken up as if they were built of cardboard, and through which
men and women have not always successfully struggled for life.

"We don't have so much loss of life in this bay as in the west bay
round the point," said Ham. "Here, you see, when there's been a
rumpus, the water quiets soon after, and the shipwrecked folk can
take to their boats; on the other side the water is rougher, and
there's less chance for them. There was one wreck here not long
since,