ad day-light, when Sir Gervaise Oakes next appeared on deck.
As the scene then offered to his view, as well as the impression it made
on his mind, will sufficiently explain to the reader the state of
affairs, some six hours later than the time last included in our
account, we refer him to those for his own impressions. The wind now
blew a real gale, though the season of the year rendered it less
unpleasant to the feelings than is usual with wintry tempests. The air
was even bland, and still charged with the moisture of the ocean; though
it came sweeping athwart sheets of foam, with a fury, at moments, which
threatened to carry the entire summits of waves miles from their beds,
in spray. Even the aquatic birds seemed to be terrified, in the instants
of the greatest power of the winds, actually wheeling suddenly on their
wings, and plunging into the element beneath to seek protection from the
maddened efforts of that to which they more properly belonged.

Still, Sir Gervaise saw that his ships bore up nobly against the fierce
strife. Each vessel showed the same canvass; viz.--a reefed fore-sail; a
small triangular piece of strong, heavy cloth, fitted between the end of
the bowsprit and the head of the fore-top-mast; a similar sail over the
quarter-deck, between the mizzen and main masts, and a close-reefed
main-top-sail Several times that morning, Captain Greenly had thought he
should be compelled to substitute a lower surface to the wind than that
of the sail last mentioned. As it was an important auxiliary, however,
in steadying the ship, and in keeping her under the command of her helm,
on each occasion the order had been delayed, until he now began to
question whether the canvass could be reduced, without too great a risk
to the men whom it would be necessary to send aloft. He had decided to
let it stand or blow away, as fortune might decide. Similar reasoning
left nearly all the other vessels under precisely the same canvass.

The ships of the vice-admiral's division had closed in the night,
agreeably to an order given before quitting the anchorage, which
directed them to come within the usual sailing distance, in the event of
the weather's menacing a separation. This command had been obeyed by the
ships astern carrying sail hard, long after the leading vessels had been
eased by reducing their canvass. The order of sailing was the
Plantagenet in the van, and the Carnatic, Achilles, Thunderer, Blenheim,
and Warspite f