en gathering on the downs
which ran along the coast, with their jagged formations showing out in
tones of dim violet and blue.

He stood now in the companion with his wife and his child, and sighed
heavily as he looked at them.

"I would gladly give the brig, and be reduced to my own two hands once
more, to have last night over again, Elizabeth!" he said.

She pressed his hand with an expression of sympathy, which answered him
better than words; and the next moment he was again the practical man,
showing her how she might tie the child to her breast with a
handkerchief.

"I can't stay with you any longer now," he said. "I am responsible for
the lives of all on board, and must do my duty by them."

"Do your duty, Salve," she said.

"And so," he concluded, as, trying to conceal his emotion, he stroked
her forehead and then the child's, "you must keep a good heart. When the
pinch comes I shall be at your side, and we shall win through it, you'll
see."

"With God's gracious help!" she answered; "remember that, Salve."

He strode away then down the deck and called the crew aft to take
counsel with him on the situation. The vessel was rapidly becoming
water-logged.

"Listen, my lads!" he said; "this is a serious business, as you can all
very clearly see. But if we only have stout hearts we may get out of it
yet, at all events with our lives. We have about three hours still
before we run upon the sandbanks; but by that time it will have begun to
get dark, and it may be difficult for the people on shore to come to our
rescue. We must steer straight in and choose the likeliest place
ourselves; and if you are of the same way of thinking we'll head for the
shore now at once, rather than wait to have the old craft flung over the
banks in the dark like a dead fish."

The crew were silent, and looked anxiously over towards the land. But
when Nils Buvaagen declared himself a supporter of the captain's plan by
crossing over the deck to him, all the others followed.

Salve went himself to the wheel, and gave the order to "Ease off the
sheet."

"Ease it is," was the answer; and that was the last order ever given on
board the Apollo.

Running now before the wind, they rapidly approached the land. Salve
stood at the wheel, resting his knee from time to time on one of the
spokes, with a concentrated look on his dark keen face, and his eye
searching like a kite's along the coast for the place they were to make
for. A couple