n upon her, throwing her quarter round, sweeping
her from stem to stern, and driving her crew into the rigging, and in an
instant there she was, driving along stem-on right for us--or, rather,
for the spot that we should occupy when she reached it. There was now
only one way of avoiding a disastrous collision, and that was by putting
our helm hard up, and, at all risks, jibing round upon the other tack;
and this we accordingly did, missing the brig by a hair's-breadth, but
springing our foremast-head so badly as the trysail jibed over, that we
had to get in the sail at once, and set a close-reefed main-staysail
instead. As for the brig, she was little better than a wreck, for as
she drove past us we saw that her rudder was gone, her bulwarks carried
away on both sides, from cat-head to taffrail, and her decks swept of
everything that was movable. It was of course utterly impossible for us
to help them in any way in the wind and sea that then raged; nor could
we follow them in their helpless progress to leeward, and stand by them,
the damage to our foremast being so serious as to utterly preclude the
possibility of getting any headsail upon the schooner until it had been
at least temporarily repaired, while the little hooker, having again
been brought-to on the starboard tack, absolutely refused to pay off
under her staysail only, which was perhaps just as well, so far as we
were concerned, since any attempt on our part to run to leeward would
almost certainly have resulted in the swamping of the schooner. What
became of the brig, and whether she outlived the gale or not, we never
knew, for she continued her erratic course to leeward, and we lost sight
of her in about an hour and a half from the time when she so nearly fell
on board us, and we saw her no more. But she was driving in a direction
that would carry her right into the track of the vortex of the storm, to
encounter which, in her wrecked and helpless condition, would infallibly
mean her destruction.

As the day wore on, the wind gradually shifted round further from the
eastward, and by nightfall it was blowing from about east-south-east,
and showing some signs of moderating, although it still blew very
heavily; much too heavily indeed to justify us in sending any hands
aloft to fish our sprung mast-head. Nevertheless, every preparation was
made for the commencement of the operation at the earliest possible
moment, as we had detected signs on board the barq