the rockets and
blue lights, as they darted into the air, served but to show them the
rugged face of the high rocks, which appeared to afford no footing by
which the summit could be gained, even if they should be so fortunate
as to reach them at all.

Whilst all on board were weighing these chances of destruction or of
safety, the vessel's head had gone round off, and a few succeeding
heavy surfs threw her again with her starboard quarter upon the rock,
and whilst she was in this position, there appeared a possibility of
getting some of the people on shore. Captain Burgess, therefore,
ordered Lieutenant Hamilton to do everything in his power to
facilitate such a proceeding, and shortly afterwards that officer, Mr.
Mends, midshipman, and about seventy others, effected a landing by
jumping either from the broken end of the mainyard, which was lying
across the ship, or from the hammock netting abaft the mizenmast;
several others who attempted to land in the same way were less
fortunate; some were crushed to death, and some drawn back by the
recoil of the surf and drowned.

From the time the ship first struck, the current had been carrying her
along the cliffs at the rate of at least a quarter of a mile an hour;
it now carried her off the rock, and she drifted along shore, a
helpless wreck, at the mercy of the winds and waves. The captain saw
that nothing more could be done for the vessel, and therefore he
directed all his energies to the preservation of the crew. The marine
who had been appointed to guard the spirit-room still remained at his
post, and never left it till commanded to do so by his superior
officer, even after the water had burst open the hatch. We mention
this as an instance of the effect of good discipline in times of the
greatest peril.

The vessel, or rather the wreck, was now carried towards a small cove,
into which she happily drifted; she struck heavily against the rocks,
then gave some tremendous yauls, and gradually sunk until nothing was
left above water but the bows, the broken bowsprit, and the wreck of
the masts as they laid on the booms.

All on board deemed that the crisis of their fate had arrived,--and
they prepared for the final struggle between life and death. There
were some moments of awful suspense, for every lurch the ill-fated
vessel gave, was expected to be the last; but when she seemed to sink
no deeper, there came the hope that her keel had touched the bottom,
and that they s