upon its expense, and silent upon
its deserts, would put a stop to hardly earned promotion, and blast with
disappointment the energies of the incipient hero. And may those to
whom the people at large have delegated their trust, and in whom they
have reposed their confidence, treat with contempt the calculations, and
miscalculations, of one without head and without heart!

Daylight again, as if unwillingly, appeared, and the wild scud flew past
the dark clouds, that seemed to sink down with their heavy burdens till
they nearly touched the sea. The waves still followed each other
mountains high; the wind blew with the same violence; and as the stormy
petrels flew over the billows, indicating by their presence that the
gale would continue, the unfortunate survivors looked at each other in
silence and despair.

I know not whether all seamen feel as I do; but I have witnessed so many
miraculous escapes, so many sudden reverses, so much, beyond all hope
and conception, achieved by a reliance upon Providence and your own
exertions, that, under the most critical circumstances, I never should
despair. If struggling in the centre of the Atlantic, with no vessel in
sight, no strength remaining, and sinking under the wave that boiled in
my ear, as memory and life were departing,--still, as long as life _did_
remain, as long as recollection held her seat, I never should abandon
Hope,--never believe that it is all over with me,--till I awoke in the
next world, and found it confirmed.

What would these men have valued their lives at in the morning? Yet at
noon a change took place: the weather evidently moderated fast; and
silence, that had reigned for so many hours, lost his empire, and the
chances of being saved began to be calculated. A reef of rocks, many of
them above water, over which the breakers still raged, lay between the
wreck and the shore, and the certainty of being dashed to pieces
precluded all attempts at reaching it, till the weather became more
moderate and the sea less agitated. But when might that be?--and how
long were they to resist the united attacks of hunger and fatigue?

The number of men still surviving was about seventy. Many, exhausted
and wounded, were hanging in a state of insensibility by the ropes with
which they had secured themselves. That our hero was among those who
remained need hardly be observed, or there would have been a close to
this eventful history. He was secured to the weather