tically than Frank
liked, with all the men looking on!

The gale continued raging with unabated force all that evening; but
towards midnight it lulled sufficiently for some sail to be set on the
ship, which was then kept more on her proper course.

CHAPTER FIVE.

A CALM.

It was a lovely dawn the morning after the storm in the Bay of Biscay.

Even Mr Adams, plain, matter-of-fact, simple, and unsympathetic sailor
as he was, without a particle of poetry or imagination about him, could
not but gaze with admiration at the glory of God's handiwork, as he
noticed the grand panorama of change that marked the progress from
darkness to light, from night to day!

Soon after his watch began, the twinkling stars had gone to rest,
putting out their tiny lanterns, as they had arisen, one be one; and
now, the violet blue of the firmament paled gradually into sea-green and
grey, soft neutral tints mixed on the great palette of Nature to receive
the roseate hue that presently illumined the whole eastern sky,
heralding the approach of the glorious orb of day. Next, streaks of
light salmon-coloured clouds shot across the horizon, their edges
decorated with a fringe of gold that gleamed brighter and more intense
each moment, the water glowing beneath the reflection as if wakening
into life: and then, the majestic sun stepping up from his ocean bed--
all radiant--"like a bridegroom out of his chamber," and moving with
giant strides higher and higher up the heavens, as if "anxious to run
his course," and make up for the lost time of the night--shone through
the transparent purple mist of the morning like a blush rose behind a
glittering veil of dewdrops!

By the time the breakfast hour arrived--"eight bells"--the blue sea was
dancing merrily in the sunshine, the waves calming down to only a
crisping curl of their foam-flecked summits, and the _Nancy Bell_ was
speeding along under a pile of canvas fore and aft from deck to truck,
Mr Adams having made good use of his time while others were sleeping to
get up the spare topgallant-mast forward and set all the upper sail he
could; so the passengers, roused up to new life by the cheery influence
of the bright summer day, coming after all the gloom and misery and
storm and tempest of the past, mustered round the cuddy table in full
force.

Mr Meldrum and the American were there as a matter of course; but, by
the side of her father, on the right of the skipper, appeared now for
the f