both went,
and were half buried and almost stifled in the soft hot sand. However,
they picked themselves up; and, Jack, mounting, away they went towards
the goal where their friends were ready to receive them. Just as they
got up to it, down came the gallant marine once more, but Jack stuck to
his back, and on all fours he crawled up to the winning-post. The poor
doctor, with Terence, as Jack said, like a huge baboon clinging behind
him, came in soon after; and the doctor declared that it was the last
time, with or without a jockey, he would ever run a race on the shores
of Africa or anywhere else. In the afternoon the blacks in parties were
taken on shore under an armed escort to bathe and exercise themselves;
and the next day, the wind shifting, the frigate and captured slaver
again made sail for their destination.

"The frigate is signalising to us," said Jack one morning to Lieutenant
Hemming, who had just come on deck. "She is going in chase of a sail to
the southward. We are to continue our course for Sierra Leone."

In a couple of hours the frigate was out of sight. There appeared to be
every promise of fine weather.

Hemming's chief concern was for the blacks, who were sickly. Several
had already died, and not a day passed without four or five being added
to the number. It was important, therefore, to make the passage as
quickly as possible. For this object the commanding officer kept
probably more sail on the ship than she would otherwise have carried.

Jack one afternoon had charge of the watch; all seemed satisfactory. As
he was taking a turn on deck, he saw Dick Needham hurrying towards him
and pointing to the sea to leeward. It was a mass of white foam. He
shouted out, "All hands shorten sail!"

Hemming and Adair rushed out of the cabin. Hemming without speaking
seized an axe, and began cutting away at the halyards; Adair and Jack
followed his example. The crew flew into the rigging with their knives,
but it was too late. The tornado was upon them; over went the ship;
down, down she heeled. The seething water rushed in at her ports.
Shrieks and cries arose from the unhappy negroes confined below. Jack
and Needham's first impulse was to knock off the hatches, and a few
blacks sprang on deck before the sea closed over their heads.

"The ship is sinking, the ship is sinking," was the cry fore and aft.

"Then a raft must be formed, my lads," sang out Lieutenant Hemming.
"Never say die,