ther the gale. Sails
were split and torn, rigging was damaged, and spars were sprung or
carried away. The wind howled as if millions of wicked spirits were
yelling in the blast. The sea rose in wild commotion, tossing the
little smacks as if they had been corks, and causing the straining
timbers to groan and creak. Many a deck was washed that night from stem
to stern, and when grey morning broke cold and dreary over the foaming
sea, not a few flags, half-mast high, told that some souls had gone to
their account. Disaster had also befallen many of the smacks. While
some were greatly damaged, a few were lost entirely with all their
crews.

Singing Peter's vessel was among the lost. The brightening day revealed
the fact that the well-known craft had disappeared. It had sunk with
all hands, and the genial fisherman's strong and tuneful voice had
ceased for ever to reverberate over the North Sea in order that it might
for ever raise a louder and still more tuneful strain of deep-toned
happiness among the harmonies of heaven.

CHAPTER NINETEEN.

RUTH FINDS THAT EVERYTHING SEEMS TO GO AGAINST HER.

Anxiously did Ruth Dotropy await the return of Captain Bream to
Yarmouth, and patiently did she refrain, in the meantime, from
questioning Mrs Bright as to her history before marriage, for that good
woman's objection to be so questioned was quite sufficient to check her
sensitive spirit. But poor Ruth's enthusiastic hopes were doomed to
disappointment at that time, for, only a few days after the captain's
departure, she received a letter from him, part of which ran as
follows:--

"DEAR MISS RUTH,--I am exceedingly sorry and almost ashamed, to be
obliged to say that I am unable to return to Yarmouth for some weeks at
least. The fact is that I have for a long time been engaged in a piece
of business--a sort of search--which has caused me much anxiety and
frequent disappointment. My lawyer, however, now thinks he has hit on
the right clue, so that I have good hope of being successful. In the
meantime will you do your best to comfort the Miss Seawards in my
absence, and explain to them that nothing but necessity could make me
leave them in the lurch in this fashion," etcetera.

"How _very_ provoking!" exclaimed Ruth, with a pretty little frown on
her innocent face after reading the letter to her stately mother.

"Why provoking, dear?" asked Mrs Dotropy. "Surely we can enjoy the
fine air of Yarmouth without Capt