the glass and crockery
in the pantry went crashing over the floor. Scarcely conscious whether
I was dreaming or awake, I grasped a post, and sprang out on a pile of
baggage, but was immediately precipitated across the cabin.
Fortunately I fell against the chambermaid, and suffered no injury.
Amid the confusion worse confounded, the screams of the women down
below, the crash of broken glasses, and the general struggle to get to
the cabin door, a German Jew sprang from his berth, and in frantic
accents begged that his life might be spared. "Take my money!" cried
he; "take it all, but for God's sake don't murder me!" The poor fellow
had evidently been aroused out of some horrible dream, and between
actual and imaginary dangers was now quite bewildered with terror. I
could not help but be amused at the grotesque expression of his face,
even at such a moment. It would have provoked a smile had we been
going to the bottom. There was no fear of that, however, as I quickly
ascertained. We were already hard and fast on the bottom. We had run
upon a sunken rock, and were so firmly wedged between its crevices
that it seemed likely we should remain there some time. As soon as all
was still, I quietly dressed myself and went on deck to take an
observation. It was just daylight. We were in the middle of a lake,
surrounded by small rocky islands. One of these was only a stone's
throw distant on our starboard. The stakes between which our course
lay were close by on the larboard. We had missed the channel by some
twenty or thirty yards, and run upon a bed of solid boulders. The
pilot, it seemed, had been drinking a little too freely of schnapps,
and had fallen asleep at the helm. It was a miracle that we were not
all dashed to pieces. A few yards to the right stood a sharp rock,
which, had we run against it, would have crushed in the entire bow of
the boat, and probably many of us would have perished.

Although there was no fear of our sinking any deeper unless the bed of
rocks gave way, it was not a pleasant prospect to be detained here,
perhaps for several days. The main shore was some five or six miles
distant, and presented an almost unbroken line of granite boulders and
dense pine forests. Most of the passengers were on deck, in a state of
high excitement; the gentlemen running about in their shirt sleeves
and drawers, and the ladies in those indescribable costumes which
ladies usually wear when they go to sleep. The captain was m