-six hours, during the whole of which
time neither Captain Farmer nor the commander had left the deck; while
most of the officers and men also had remained up on duty, it being a
case almost of "all hands" from the beginning of the tempest to its end!

CHAPTER TWENTY ONE.

THE SPANISH CAPTAIN'S STORY.

When I went up on deck that morning I could hardly believe my eyes, on
seeing that the storm and all its wild surroundings had miraculously
disappeared; for, the sun was shining brightly on a blue sea that seemed
to ripple with laughter and the good old ship was speeding along under
all plain sail, looking none the worse for the buffeting she had
experienced only a few hours before!

"Rather a change from yesterday, ain't it, youngster?" observed Mr
Gilham, who was officer of the watch, addressing me kindly, noticing the
expression of astonishment on my face as I glanced up aloft and then
over the side. "Things look a little more ship-shape than they were
then."

"Yes, sir," I replied. "But what a fearful gale it was!"

"Pooh, nonsense, Vernon!" cried he, with a laugh. "Don't overlay your
yarns like that. We've certainly had a bit of a blow, but I've seen it
much worse crossing the bay!"

Of course, I could not contradict him; and, I may here mention that on
narrating the circumstance to Dad on my return home some time
afterwards, he said that he had never known a sailor acknowledge
anything unusual about a storm at the immediate moment of its
occurrence, or even shortly afterwards.

All those with whom he had ever been brought in contact, Dad told me,
might possibly allow that the wind was "freshening," perhaps, or
"blowing stiffly," or "inclined to be rough"; but, a gale or a hurricane
they would never admit, in spite of the fact of its "blowing great guns
and small-arms!"

Should anyone, Dad also said, incautiously hazard some definite opinion
on the state of the weather, any seaman thus spoken to would invariably
recall a previous occasion within his own experience when it was really
bad enough to speak about--it being the rule with all true sons of the
sea to minimise danger and laugh at the perils they have escaped,
instead of making mountains out of molehills in the manner natural to
most landsmen!

Besides thus upsetting my ideas as to the terrible ordeal we had gone
through, concerning which, however, I held to my own view in spite of
his protest to be contrary, although, of course, I did not