glimpse of the angry ocean--nothing but the huge billows chasing each
other in towards the land and the seething foam at the base of the
crags, on which they broke themselves in impotent fury when they found
their further course arrested by the rocky ramparts of the island.

Nor could the lad hear anything beyond the crash of the breakers and
splash of the eddying water, which sometimes washed up to his feet, as
he stood on the boulder gazing out vainly to sea, the sound of the
breaking billows being mingled with the shriek of the wind as it
whistled by overhead.

Nothing but the tumult of the sea, stirred into frenzy by the storm-
blast of angry Aeolus!

After a time, Eric suddenly recollected that his brother could not move
far from the hut and must be wondering what had become of him; and,
recognising as well the fact that he was powerless alone to do anything
where he was, even if a ship should be in danger, he returned towards
the cottage to rejoin Fritz, his path up the valley being lit up quite
clearly by the expiring bonfire, which still flamed out every now and
then, as the wind fanned it in its mad rush up the gorge, stirring out
the embers into an occasional flash of brilliancy.

Fritz, usually so calm, was in a terribly anxious state when his brother
reached him.

"Well, have you seen anything?" he asked impatiently.

"No," said Eric sorrowfully. "There's nothing to be seen."

"But _you_ heard another cannon, did you not?"

"Oh yes, and it seemed closer in."

"So I thought, too," said the other, whom the sound of the heavy guns,
from his old experience in war, appeared to affect like a stimulant.
"Can't we do anything? It is terrible to stand idly here and allow our
fellow-creatures to perish, without trying to save them!"

"What could we do?" asked Eric helplessly, all the buoyancy gone out of
him. He seemed to be quite another lad.

"You couldn't launch the boat without me, eh?"

"No," answered Eric; "I couldn't move it off the beach with all my
strength--I tried just now."

Fritz ground his teeth in rage at his invalid condition.

"It serves me right to be crippled in this fashion!" he cried. "It all
results from my making such a fool of myself the other day, after that
goat on the plateau. I ought to have known better."

"You need not vex yourself, brother, about that," said Eric. "If there
were twenty of us to get the boat into the water, instead of two, she
could not live in the