he barque, steering a course that,
if persisted in, would have resulted in our striking her fair amidships
on her starboard broadside, but which, by attention to the helm at the
proper moment, with a due allowance for our own heavy lee drift, was
intended to take us close enough to the sinking craft to enable us to
speak her. Presently, at a word from the skipper, the third mate--who
was acting as the captain's _aide_--sang out for some men to lay aft and
back the main-topsail; and at the same moment the helm was eased gently
up, with the result that our bows fell off just sufficiently to clear
the barque's starboard quarter.

I shall never forget the sight that the unfortunate craft presented at
that moment. Her foremast and jib-boom were under the bows, with all
attached, and were hanging, a tangled mass of raffle, by the shrouds and
stays, leaving about twenty feet of naked, jagged, and splintered stump
of the lower-mast standing above the deck; and her main-topmast was also
gone; but the wreckage of this had been cut away and had gone adrift,
leaving only the heel in the cap, and the ragged ends of the topmast
shrouds streaming from the rim of the top. She had been a very
smart-looking little vessel in her time, painted black with false ports,
and under her bowsprit she sported a handsomely-carved half-length
figure of a crowned woman, elaborately painted and gilded. She carried
a short topgallant forecastle forward, and a full poop aft, reaching to
within about twenty-five feet from the mainmast; and between these two
structures the bulwarks had been completely swept away, leaving only a
jagged stump of a stanchion here and there protruding above the
covering-board. She was sunk so low in the water that her channels were
buried; and the water that was in her, making its way slowly and with
difficulty through the interstices of her cargo, had at this time
collected forward, and was pinning her head down to such an extent that
her bows were unable to lift to the 'scend of the sea, with the result
that every sea broke, hissing white, over her topgallant forecastle, and
swept right aft to the poop, against the front of which it dashed
itself, as against the vertical face of a rock, throwing blinding and
drenching clouds of spray over the little group of cowering people who
crouched as closely as they could huddle behind the meagre and
inadequate shelter of the skylight.

I counted fourteen of these poor souls, an