ur cry."

Ah! in moments of dire distress and fear, the soul that has before been
dumb cries unto God. Poor frail mortals think they can do very well
without God, when skies are blue, and all things, golden, bright, and
prosperous; but in the hour of death, and in all times of tribulation,
few indeed are to be found who do not cry to God for refuge and
deliverance.

Jack stood face to face with death, and he knew it. All his short life
seemed to rise clearly before him, and his mother's face as he knelt to
repeat his little prayer at her knee in childish days. His mother! she
had been left a widow, although she could not believe it; his mother!
to whom he should have been a stay and comfort, deserted, because he
had been a coward, and could not meet the trials of his daily life--his
aunt's sharp tongue, and Mr. Skinner's side-hits.

He had run away to sea to escape these, to please himself--and this was
the end. Oh! his mother! his mother! Had he not seen her watch and
wait for his father's return? and had he not seen the lines of care
deeping on her sweet face? And now he had added to her sorrow, and
could never hear her words of forgiveness.

All this passed through Jack's mind far more quickly than I can write
it here, or you can read it; and hot tears mingled with the cold, salt
spray, which drenched him through and through as he stood firm by the
rope which was entrusted to him.

The storm raged with unabated fury, and the darkness was only just
pierced by the rising moon, itself invisible, but which cast a strange
weird whiteness athwart the gloom.

The worst had not yet come. It was about midnight that cries arose
above the storm, and a violent shock told that the _Galatea_ had struck
on a rock. There was no hope then--the _Galatea_ was doomed.

The boats had been kept in readiness, and the captain's voice was
heard, shouting his orders to let them down. For the _Galatea_ had
parted in midships, and was settling down into those black waters
where, here and there, the white surf on the wave-crests was seen with
ghastly clearness in the murky gloom.

"All women and children first," the captain ordered; and Peter's
mother, clasping the child close, with the few passengers, were let
down into the first boat.

"Back, you coward!" the mate shouted, as the man who had been so
unfeeling to Jack, on first starting, stumbled forward and tried to
jump into the boat. Alas! too late was the command to sto