ind, I beheld a huge sea rise far above
my head. I turned aside, caught my breath, and looked again. The wave
over-topped the _Ghost_, and I gazed sheer up and into it. A shaft of
sunlight smote the over-curl, and I caught a glimpse of translucent,
rushing green, backed by a milky smother of foam.

Then it descended, pandemonium broke loose, everything happened at once.
I was struck a crushing, stunning blow, nowhere in particular and yet
everywhere. My hold had been broken loose, I was under water, and the
thought passed through my mind that this was the terrible thing of which
I had heard, the being swept in the trough of the sea. My body struck
and pounded as it was dashed helplessly along and turned over and over,
and when I could hold my breath no longer, I breathed the stinging salt
water into my lungs. But through it all I clung to the one idea--_I must
get the jib backed over to windward_. I had no fear of death. I had no
doubt but that I should come through somehow. And as this idea of
fulfilling Wolf Larsen's order persisted in my dazed consciousness, I
seemed to see him standing at the wheel in the midst of the wild welter,
pitting his will against the will of the storm and defying it.

I brought up violently against what I took to be the rail, breathed, and
breathed the sweet air again. I tried to rise, but struck my head and
was knocked back on hands and knees. By some freak of the waters I had
been swept clear under the forecastle-head and into the eyes. As I
scrambled out on all fours, I passed over the body of Thomas Mugridge,
who lay in a groaning heap. There was no time to investigate. I must
get the jib backed over.

When I emerged on deck it seemed that the end of everything had come. On
all sides there was a rending and crashing of wood and steel and canvas.
The _Ghost_ was being wrenched and torn to fragments. The foresail and
fore-topsail, emptied of the wind by the manoeuvre, and with no one to
bring in the sheet in time, were thundering into ribbons, the heavy boom
threshing and splintering from rail to rail. The air was thick with
flying wreckage, detached ropes and stays were hissing and coiling like
snakes, and down through it all crashed the gaff of the foresail.

The spar could not have missed me by many inches, while it spurred me to
action. Perhaps the situation was not hopeless. I remembered Wolf
Larsen's caution. He had expected all hell to break loose, and here it