cended full upon his back, dashing him forward and out
over the bows. The tiller thus released, the boat broached to, filled,
and capsized, and her three occupants were left struggling in the water
and fighting for their lives, while the craft was flung bottom-upward on
the beach and dashed into staves by the violence of the shock. Tossed
hither and thither, to and fro, Roger strove to get his breath; but he
could not, for he seemed buried in salt water; and he was suffering all
the agonies of suffocation when his head emerged for a moment from the
water and he drew a hasty breath that seemed to put fresh strength into
his fast-failing limbs. Yet, strive against it as he would, although he
felt the beach under his feet, they were fast being dragged from under
him; he was in the clutch of the fatal undertow, and he knew that,
exhausted as he was, if he were once swept back again into deep water he
would drown, for his strength was now at an end. Summoning up all his
energy, therefore, he gave vent to a loud shout for help--although help
seemed to be the last thing he might expect at that moment--and made one
last struggle for life. But, even as his senses failed him, and he was
sinking backward in that fatal embrace, a pair of strong hands clutched
his hair and arm, and for a few seconds he felt as though, between the
sea on the one hand and a sturdy British seaman on the other, he were
being torn asunder. Presently, however, the wave receded; the awful
feeling of being sucked back left him, and, opening his eyes, he saw
that he was on terra firma, with the sea behind him. "Now run," shouted
the seaman--one Jake Irwin, who had been in the boat with him,--"run,
Master Trevose, before the next sea catches ye." At the same time he
dragged the lad up the beach with all his strength, and they reached
safety as another wave came rolling hungrily after them, to retire again
with an angry snarl, as though cheated of its lawful prey. Roger stood
up and wiped the wet from his eyes and ears, and wrung the water out of
his clothes as well as he could, and looked about him. He saw the two
seamen--one of whom had rescued him, only just in the nick of time, from
a watery grave--standing close by; and not far from them he perceived
the figure of the man whom they had come to rescue, and for whom they
had so nearly met disaster. The seamen who had rowed in the boat seemed
none the worse for their adventure, and asked the lad how