en blowing, all I can say, ladies and gentlemen, she'll have seen
more tumbling and weather in forty-eight hours than you'll have any
idea of though I was to keep you at sea for ten years in this ship."

Mrs. Barstow, with a motherly manner, approached Grace, who bowed and
thanked her, and together they walked to the companion hatch and
disappeared.

By this time the boat had been hoisted, and the ship was full of the
animation and business of her sailors piling canvas upon her. The
sudden stagnation that had fallen was now threaded by a weak draught of
air out of the east where the brightness of the new weather had first
shown. The compacted pall of cloud was fast breaking up, settling into
large bodies of vapour, with spaces of dim blue sky between and in the
south there stood a shaft of golden sunshine that flashed up a space of
water at its base in splendour, though past it the sulky heaps of cloud
loomed the darker for that magical and beautiful lance of radiance.
Miles away in the south-west a white sail hovered, but nothing else
broke the sea-line.

I took all this in at a glance: also the figure of my poor, mutilated
yacht heaving forlorn and naked upon the swell that still rolled
heavily, as though after the savage vexing of its heart during the past
hours, old ocean could not quickly draw its breath placidly. The
little vessel looked but a toy from the height of the poop of the iron
ship. As I surveyed her, I marvelled to think that she had
successfully encountered the weather of the past two days and nights.
I could see one of the men--Dick Files--steadily labouring at the pump
whilst the others were busy with the tackle and gear that supported the
mast. But even as I watched, the _Carthusian_ had got way upon her,
and was dwarfing yet the poor brave little _Spitfire_ as she slided
round to the government of her helm, her yards squaring, her canvas
spreading, and her crew chorussing all about her decks as she went.

The captain asked me many questions, most of which I answered
mechanically, for my thoughts were fixed upon the little yacht, and my
heart was with the poor fellows who had resolved to carry her home--but
with _them_ only! not with _her_. No! as I watched her rolling, and
the fellow pumping, not for worlds would I have gone aboard of her
again with Grace, though Caudel should have yelled out that the leak
was stopped, and though a fair, bright breezy day, with promise of its
quiet lastin