evident that all
command of her was lost. She rolled gunwale under, and her remaining
mast went by the board.

"Nothing can save her, now, sir," replied the master.

"No," replied the captain. "We have done our work, and must now try to
save ourselves."

"Secure the guns--be smart, my lads, you work for your lives. We must
put the mainsail on her, Mr Pearce, and draw off if we can."

The master shook his head. "Hands by the clue-garnets and buntlines--
man the mainsheet--let go those leech-lines, youngster--haul aboard."

"It's a pity, too, by God," said the captain, looking over the
hammock-rails at the French vessel, which was now running before the
wind right on to the shore.--"Eight or nine hundred poor devils will be
called to their last account in the course of a few minutes. I wish we
could save them."

"You should have thought of that before, sir," said the master, with a
grave smile at this reaction of feeling on the part of the captain.
"Nothing can save them, and I am afraid that nothing but a slant of wind
or a miracle can help ourselves."

"She has struck, sir, and is over on her broadside," said the
quarter-master, who was standing on the carronade slide.

"Mind your conn, sir; keep your eyes on the weather-leech of the sail,
and not upon that ship," answered the captain, with asperity.

In the meantime, the mainsail had been set by the first-lieutenant, and
the crew, unoccupied, had their eyes directed for a little while upon
the French vessel, which lay on her beam-ends, enveloped in spray; but
they also perceived what, during the occupation and anxiety of action,
they had not had leisure to attend to, namely, the desperate situation
of their own ship. The promontory was now broad on the weather bow, and
a reef of rocks, partly above water, extended from it to leeward of the
frigate. Such was the anxiety of the ship's company for their own
safety, that the eyes of the men were turned away from the stranded
vessel, and fixed upon the rocks. The frigate did all that a gallant
vessel could do, rising from the trough of the sea, and shaking the
water from her, as she was occasionally buried forecastle under, from
the great pressure of the sail, cleaving the huge masses of the element
with her sharp stem, and trembling fore and aft with the violence of her
own exertions. But the mountainous waves took her with irresistible
force from her chesstree, retarding her velocity, and forcing her ea