, and take all the canvas off her," he answered with earnestness.
"It's doing her no good just now, and we haven't another suit of sails
if we lose them. When the wind does come, it is on one before a man has
time to turn round and save the teeth being whisked out of his mouth.
Come, my lads, be smart, and hand the canvas," he added, calling to
Rockets and the other men.

I was soon very glad that I was not above taking an old seaman's advice.
Scarcely ten minutes had passed, during which time the calm had been
more profound than ever, when, as suddenly as Grampus had foretold, the
whole ocean around us seemed covered with a sheet of seething foam, and
the whirlwind, in all the majesty of its strength, struck the vessel,
pressing her down till her bulwarks touched the water, and I thought she
would have gone over altogether. I sprang to the helm and put it up,
while Grampus hoisted the fore-staysail just a foot or so above the
deck. Even then the canvas was nearly blown out of the bolt-ropes; so
far she felt its power, however, and, her head spinning round as if she
had been a straw, away we drove before the hurricane. Where were we
driving to was the question. I anxiously consulted the chart. We were
in that deep bay in the island of Saint Domingo, with Cape Donna Maria
to the southward, and Cape Saint Nicholas to the north, and I saw that a
slight variation in the course of the gale might hurl us on the coast,
where the chance of our escaping with our lives would be small indeed.
Happily the wind at present came out of the bay, or I believe my
ill-found little schooner would have gone to the bottom, as did many a
noble ship about that time. The sea, even as it was, soon became lashed
into furious billows, which broke around us in masses of foam, which
went flying away over the troubled surface of the ocean, covering us as
would a heavy fall of snow. Grampus and I stood at the helm, keeping
the little vessel as well as we could directly before the gale, but we
tumbled about terrifically, and more than once I caught him casting
anxious glances over his shoulder astern, as if he expected some of the
seas, which came roaring up after us, to break over our decks.

"What do you think of it, Grampus?" said I.

"Why, Mr Hurry, sir, I don't like the look of things," he answered.
"If one of them seas was to fall aboard of us, it would wash every soul
of us off the deck, and maybe send the craft in a moment to the botto