onditions, and laughed the
little unpleasantness off accordingly.

Frobisher now gave orders that all the guns were to be doubly secured,
so that they might not break adrift in the event of the ship being
overtaken by the typhoon, the approach of which now appeared most
probable; and everything that might possibly strike adrift was fastened
and double fastened, in view of what was almost certainly coming. The
canvas dodgers round the bridge were taken down and put away, and the
quarter-deck and forecastle awnings were removed, and the stanchions
taken out of their sockets and placed below. The lashings of the boat
covers were again looked to, and the boats themselves secured more
firmly in their chocks, until finally there remained nothing more
possible to be done for security, and the outbreak of the storm could be
awaited with reasonable confidence.

About eight o'clock in the evening the swell became even more
pronounced, and the ship commenced to roll so heavily that it was
necessary to run hand-lines fore and aft the deck to enable the seamen
to go about their duties, otherwise there was great danger of the men
being hurled right across the decks and sustaining serious injuries.
The gloomy, lowering, red light which had suffused the sky at the going
down of the sun had given place to a dull, copper-coloured glow, mingled
with a kind of brassy glare, all the more ominous from the fact that
there was no visible source of its origin; for in the ordinary course of
events it should have been quite dark, except for such light as was
given by the moon, the sun having disappeared more than an hour and a
half previously. So strong was this unearthly light that the horizon
was plainly visible in all directions, save away to the northward, and
there the blackness was intense. Not the faintest glimmer of a star was
observable through the inky curtain which covered about ten degrees of
the horizon in that direction, but now and again a sudden dazzle of
wicked-looking forked lightning shot across the face of the bank. As
yet, however, there was no sound of thunder, and the same unearthly
stillness prevailed, save when a moaning sound could be plainly heard as
the puffs of hot wind more and more frequently scurried through the
ship's wire rigging, or sobbed weirdly in the hoods of the ventilators.

"There is certainly something pretty bad coming, sir," Drake presently
volunteered, unable any longer to endure the strained s