himself temporarily overmastered by the accumulated terrors of his
surroundings; but Chesney, the captain of the Indiaman, proved equal to
the occasion. For a single instant he stood aghast at the awful
spectacle that met his horrified gaze; then he pulled himself together
and, instinctively assuming the command--as, under the circumstances, he
was perfectly justified in doing,--he made his voice ring from end to
end of the ship as he ordered all hands to be called. The order,
however, was scarcely necessary, for by this time the watch below--
startled by the shock of the lightning-stroke, the shrieks of the
injured, and that indefinable conviction of something being wrong that
occasionally seizes people upon the occurrence of some dire
catastrophe--were tumbling up through the fore-scuttle with much of the
hurry and confusion of panic, which was greatly increased when they
beheld the masts, sails, and rigging all ablaze. By voice and example,
however, we presently contrived to steady them and get them under
control; and then, while one gang was told off to convey the injured men
below--Dumaresq meanwhile hurrying away to summon the doctor, who was
busily engaged in the cabin, endeavouring to soothe some of the lady
passengers, who were in hysterics,--the rest of the crew were set to
work to rig the pumps, muster the buckets, and pass along the hose. In
a few minutes all was ready, the pumps were started, and the chief mate,
with a line to which the end of the hose was bent, climbed up into the
main-top, from which he began to play upon the fire. But by this time
the flames had acquired such a firm hold upon the spars, canvas, and
heavily tarred rigging that the jet of water from the hose proved quite
incapable of producing any visible effect whatever upon them; and the
mate himself soon became so hemmed in by the fire that he was in the
very act of retreating to the deck when the flood-gates of heaven were
opened, and the rain suddenly pelted down in such overwhelming torrents
that in less than five minutes the conflagration aloft was completely
extinguished; but not until the sails had been burnt to tinder, the
spars badly charred, and most of the standing and running rigging
destroyed.

With the outburst of rain that had rendered us such excellent service
the violence of the storm sensibly abated, perhaps because it had nearly
spent itself; at all events the lightning discharges now succeeded each
other at stead