having righted, now drifted with greater rapidity to her doom.

It was an awful moment for these miserable men! If they could have only
vented their feelings in vigorous action it would have been some relief,
but this was impossible, for wave after wave washed over the stern and
swept the decks, obliging them to hold on for their lives.

At last the shock came. With a terrible crash the good ship struck and
recoiled, quivering in every plank. On the back of another wave she was
lifted up, and again cast on the cruel rocks. There was a sound of
rending wood and snapping cordage, and next moment the foremast was in
the sea, tossing violently, and beating against the ship's side, to
which it was still attached by part of the rigging. Three of the men
who had clung to the shrouds of the foremast were swept overboard and
drowned. Once more the wreck recoiled, rose again on a towering billow,
and was launched on the rocks with such violence that she was forced
forward and upwards several yards, and remained fixed.

Slight although this change was for the better, it sufficed to infuse
hope into the hearts of the hitherto despairing sailors. The dread of
being instantly dashed to pieces was removed, and with one consent they
scrambled to the bow to see if there was any chance of reaching the
shore.

Clinging to the fore-part of the ship they found the cook, a negro,
whose right arm supported the insensible form of a woman--the only woman
on board that ship. She was the wife of the carpenter. Her husband had
been among the first of those who were swept overboard and drowned.

"Hold on to her, massa," exclaimed the cook; "my arm a'most brok."

The mate, to whom he appealed, at once grasped the woman, and was about
to attempt to drag her under the lee of the caboose, when the vessel
slipped off the rocks into the sea, parted amidships, and was instantly
overwhelmed.

For some minutes Bill Bowls struggled powerfully to gain the shore, but
the force of the boiling water was such that he was as helpless as if he
had been a mere infant; his strength, great though it was, began to
fail; several severe blows that he received from portions of the wreck
nearly stunned him, and he felt the stupor that preceded death
overpowering him, when he was providentially cast upon a ledge of rock.
Against the same ledge most of his shipmates were dashed by the waves
and killed, but he was thrown upon it softly. Retaining sufficient