em all, and shall have them well out of sight, before morning."

When day broke, indeed, the topsails of three of the Spanish ships
could be seen on the horizon; but in two or three hours these sank
out of sight, and the Swan was headed on her course west.

Chapter 5: Shipwrecked.

For six days the Swan sailed westward before a gentle wind. Then
clouds were seen rising in the north, and spreading with great
rapidity across the horizon.

"We are in for a tempest," Captain Reuben said. "Never have I seen
the clouds rising more rapidly.

"Get her sail off her, Standing, as quickly as possible."

The crew fell to work, and in a very few minutes the Swan was
stripped of the greater part of her canvas. But quickly as the men
worked, the storm came up more rapidly, and the crew had but half
finished their work when, with a roar and turmoil that almost
bewildered them, the gale struck the vessel. Her head had been laid
to the south, so that the wind should take her astern; and it was
well that it was so, for had it struck her on the beam, she would
assuredly have been capsized, even had not a rag of canvas been
shown, for the wind would have caught her lofty forecastle and
poop. As it was she plunged heavily forward, quivering as if from a
blow. Then her bluff bows bore her up and, with a leap, she sprang
forward and sped along before the gale.

"I have seen as sudden a squall among the Greek islands," Captain
Reuben shouted in the mate's ear; "but never elsewhere. I hope that
this may prove as short as do the gales in that quarter."

"I hope so," the mate replied, "for we know not how far the land
may be distant."

But though the captain knew it not, they had been caught in one of
those furious gales that were, afterwards, the terror of the
Spaniards; blowing for a week or ten days without intermission, and
being the cause of the wreck of many a stout ship. The sea got up
rapidly, and the wind seemed to increase in fury as night fell, and
for three days the ship ran before it. The waist was frequently
deluged with water, and it required six men at the helm to keep her
straight before the wind.

The crew were worn out with fatigue and want of sleep, for running
as they were in this unknown sea, none could say what might happen,
or when land might be sighted ahead. The captain never left the
poop--he and the mates taking their places, by turn, with the men
at the helm; for the slightest error in steering might