few of the ocean travellers, however, mostly men
who had seen salt spray before, sat huddled in their rugs under the lee
of the deck-house, conversing upon such cheering topics as collisions,
and icebergs, and leaks. One who had not crossed the sea before, but who
was free from sickness, said,

"I am told that we are now on the banks of Newfoundland, where foolish
men go in small sailing-vessels to fish."

"Foolish you may well call them," said an old voyager, "for they lie
there in thick weather and thin without making a sign of their presence.
I remember once, steaming slowly through a dense fog on a great
Cunarder, we heard the fog-horn of a single sailing craft, and presently
that ceased. A minute later the fog lifted, and there were thirty sail
of them within the circumference of a mile. I tell you, those fellows
are--"

"Sail ho!" cried the lookout forward, and several passengers sprang to
their feet. They knew that it was out of the common order of things on a
merchant steamer to make a noise about a passing sail, such fussiness
being left to men-of-war that have nothing more to do. They crowded to
the rail of the ship, and far ahead they saw what seemed to be a small
sloop staggering over the big seas under very scant canvas. The lookout
and the officer on the bridge exchanged some words, from which the
passengers learned that the sailor made the vessel out to be in
distress.

"Call away the whale-boat!" cried the officer, and in a moment the
boatswain's pipe was screeching, and three or four seamen trotted aft in
their oilskins.

"A rescue!" exclaimed the new voyager. "I had no hope that I should ever
be so fortunate as to see such a thing."

"I'm not so certain that you'll regard it as good fortune," said an old
voyager. "Sometimes these things are tragic, especially in a rising
gale, when your own boat's crew may be lost in the attempt."

"Do you think it may come to that?"

"Ay, man, it may in such a sea; but let us hope for the best. See, we
are coming abreast of the cripple. But we must cross to the other side;
our ship will go to windward of her." And marvelling at the old
voyager's sea lore, the new one went with the others to the
weather-rail, where the force of the gale came upon them and beat their
breath back into their nostrils.

"Heaven's mercy!" exclaimed the new voyager, "but it is a sad sight."

She was a little schooner of some fifty tons. Her foremast had been
carried away about t