ank from him with horror, and as she fell back, the sun
gleamed on the silver fish she was wearing at her throat. The chief made
a rude snatch at it; the Princess, however, was quicker than he, and hit
him a good box on the ear.

"Ow!" cried the chief, dancing up and down with rage. "I'll fix you, you
ill-tempered minx. Here, somebody, tie this girl to the mast for the
rest of the day, and give her nothing but bread and water."

In obedience to his order, the Princess, with her arms tied by the
wrists behind her back, was lashed to the mast. When she had been
securely bound, the chief, whose ear was still tingling, took the silver
fish. He was looking at it when he saw something which made him drop the
fish on the deck.

Out of the forecastle door thick clouds of black mist were rolling,
exactly as if the hold of the ship were on fire. For a meddlesome pirate
had found the leather bag of storm-wind and had opened it, mistaking it
for a bag of wine.

The strange clouds, swirling round the deck, grew instant by instant
darker and denser. Soon the tops of the masts could no longer be
distinguished. The sun took on a horrible copper hue, and the sea became
a mottled black and green. A howling wind arose.

A moment later, with the violence of an explosion, the storm burst.
Mountain-high rose the glassy white-capped waves. The lightning fell in
violet cataracts, and thunder roared and tumbled through the caverns of
the sky. An ocean of hissing rain fell into the waters.

Suddenly the pirate chief, as he staggered down the stairs, shouted, "We
are lost!"

Just astern, an enormous, glassy wave, higher than the masts of the
ship, was about to break. The pirates yelled, but little good their
yelling did them. An instant later the wave broke upon the deck, and
crashing tons of green water swept every single pirate into the sea.
Slowly, and with the tense struggle of a wounded animal, the good ship
lifted itself from the waves.

The Princess was the only human being left on board. Only the cords
which bound her to the mast had saved her from being swept away.

Now, when the water swept the deck, the silver fish which lay at the
Princess's feet became alive and darted over the rail into the sea.

The storm continued. The helpless Princess expected every minute to sink
with the ship into the roaring waters. Suddenly, to her horror, a high
rocky island appeared a few miles ahead. Toward this island, over whose
cruel reefs