rmoil, a momentary quiet, and I
roused up, to find the craft floating on her side, about a third out of
water, but apt to turn bottom up at any moment from the weight of the
water-soaked gear and canvas, which will sink, you know, when wet.

"I was hanging in my bight of rope from a belaying pin, my feet clear
of the perpendicular deck, and my ears tortured by the sound of men
overboard crying for help--men who had not lashed themselves. Among
them I knew was the skipper, a mild-mannered little fellow, and the
second mate, an incompetent tough from Portsmouth, who had caused me
lots of trouble by his abuse of the men and his depending upon me to
stand by him.

"Nothing could be done for them; they were adrift on the back wall of a
moving mountain that towered thirty degrees above the horizon to port;
and another moving mountain, as big as the first, was coming on from
starboard--caused by the tumble into the sea of the uplifted water.

"Did you ever fall overboard in a full suit of clothes? If you did, you
know the mighty exercise of strength required to climb out. I was a
strong, healthy man at the time, but never in my life was I so tested.
I finally got a grip on the belaying pin and rested; then, with an
effort that caused me physical pain, I got my right foot up to the
pinrail and rested again; then, perhaps more by mental strength than
physical--for I loved life and wanted to live--I hooked my right foot
over the rail, reached higher on the rope, rested again, and finally
hove myself up to the mizzen rigging, where I sat for a few moments to
get my breath, and think, and look around.

"Forward, I saw men who had lashed themselves to the starboard rail,
and they were struggling, as I had struggled, to get up to the
horizontal side of the vessel. They succeeded, but at the time I had no
use for them. Sailors will obey orders, if they understand the orders,
but this was an exigency outside the realm of mere seamanship.

"Men were drowning off to port; men, like myself, were climbing up to
temporary safety afforded by the topsides of a craft on her beam ends;
and aft, in the alleyway, was the German professor, unlashed, but safe
and secure in his narrow confines, one leg through a cabin window, and
both hands gripping the rail, while he bellowed like a bull, not for
himself, however--but for his menagerie in the empty hold.

"There was small chance for the brutes--smaller than for ourselves,
left on the upper ra