I could not turn it back. I have heard of like cases and even
stranger; of men forgetting their own names and very identity after some
such accident as mine. All I had forgotten was the evil scene in
Jensen's cabin, the three evil schemers, their evil flag.

I was a pretty skilled seaman now, thanks to my Captain's patience and
my own eagerness, and I was able to lend a hand at the work with the
best. The first thing we did was to throw the lead, and sorry
information it yielded us. For we found that we had forty-eight feet of
water before the vessel and much less behind her. It was then proposed
that we should throw our cannon overboard, in the hope that when our
ship was lightened of so much heavy metal she might by good hap be
brought to float again. I remember as well as yesterday the face of
Cornelys Jensen when this determination was arrived at. He saw that it
must be done, but the necessity pricked him bitterly. 'There's no help
for it,' he said aloud to Hatchett, with a sigh. Captain Marmaduke took
the expression, as I afterwards learnt, as one of pity for him and his
ship and her gear of war. But it set me racking my tired brain again for
that lost knowledge about Jensen which would have made his meaning plain
to me.

It was further decided to let fall an anchor, but while the men were
employed upon this piece of work the conditions under which we toiled
changed greatly for the worse. Black clouds came creeping up all round
the sky, which blotted out the moonlight and changed all that white foam
into curdling ink, and with the coming of these clouds the wind began to
rise, at first little and moaningly, like a child in pain, and then
suddenly very loudly indeed, until it grew to a great storm, that
brought with it sheets of the most merciless rain that I had then ever
witnessed. Now, indeed, we were in dismal case, wrapped up as we were in
all the horrors of darkness, of rain and of wind, which added not merely
a gloom to our situation, but vastly increased danger. For our ship,
surrounded as she was with rocks and shoals, though she might have lain
quiet enough while the sea was calm, now before the fury of the waves
kept continually striking, and I could see that the fear of every man
was that she would shortly go to pieces.

CHAPTER XVIII

THE NIGHT AND MORNING

It seemed such a heart-breaking thing to be hitched in that place, so
immovable, while the seas were slapping us and the wind so foull