e lake
noisy when we got under way, bound for a flatboat ferry. Our
skipper, it turned out, had little knowledge of those waters. He
had shortened sail, and said he was not afraid of the weather. The
wind, out of the southeast, came harder as it drove us on. Before
we knew it, the whole kit and boodle of us were in a devil of a
shakeup there in the broad water. D'ri and I were down among the
horses and near being trampled under in the roll. We tried to put
about then, but the great gusts of wind made us lower sail and drop
anchor in a hurry. Soon the horses were all in a tumble and one on
top of the other. We had to jump from back to back to save
ourselves. It was no pretty business, I can tell you, to get to
the stairway. D'ri was stripped of a boot-leg, and I was cut in
the chin by a front hoof, going ten feet or so to the upper deck.
To the man who was never hit in the chin by a horse's hoof let me
say there is no such remedy for a proud spirit. Bullets are much
easier to put up with and keep a civil tongue in one's head. That
lower deck was a kind of horses' hell. We had to let them alone.
They got astraddle of one another's necks, and were cut from ear to
fetlock--those that lived, for some of them, I could see, were
being trampled to death. How many I never knew, for suddenly we
hit a reef there in the storm and the black night. I knew we had
drifted to the north shore, and as the sea began to wash over us it
was every man for himself. The brig went up and down like a
sledge-hammer, and at every blow her sides were cracking and
caving. She keeled over suddenly, and was emptied of horse and
man. A big wave flung me far among the floundering horses. My
fingers caught in a wet mane; I clung desperately between crowding
flanks. Then a big wave went over us. I hung on, coming up
astride my capture. He swam vigorously, his nose high, blowing
like a trumpet. I thought we were in for a time of it, and had
very little hope for any landing, save in kingdom come. Every
minute I was head under in the wash, and the roaring filled me with
that mighty terror of the windfall. But, on my word, there is no
captain like a good horse in bad water. Suddenly I felt him hit
the bottom and go forward on his knees. Then he reared up, and
began to jump in the sand. A big wave washed him down again. He
fell on his side in a shallow, but rose and ran wearily over a soft
beach. In the blackness around me I could