So the list grew irregularly, as such lists do grow, and the Vicar met with a good deal to encourage him, as well as with a certain amount that was saddening.
He did not, however, depend upon the neighbourhood alone, but wrote to friends and acquaintances and strangers too, in all parts of England, asking them to contribute towards the same object. So vigorously did he exert himself, that in a few weeks he was able to announce good success from the pulpit. He was indeed far from having gained the whole sum, but he had received actually as much as three hundred and fifty pounds; and if he could collect one hundred pounds more, that would suffice. He had been in correspondence with the National Lifeboat Institution; and that Society having just received an unexpected legacy of six hundred pounds towards the purchase of a lifeboat in some locality, where it might be needed, was willing to use this legacy for the needs of Old Maxham.
"The cost of a lifeboat, fully equipped, with carriage and boat-house, amounts to about one thousand and fifty pounds," the Vicar said. "That six hundred, with the three hundred and fifty which we have collected, gives us nine hundred and fifty pounds; and I have undertaken, if possible, to get the remaining hundred pounds. When the boat is actually started, there will of course be a certain amount of annual outlay, to keep it in an efficient state,—repairs, salaries to the men, and so on,—amounting to about one hundred pounds a year. For this we shall have a committee and collect what we can, and the rest will be undertaken by the Society.
"And now, my friends, I want you all to help me. Some of you have done much already, I know; and most of you have done something. Still, perhaps you may be able to do just a little more. Think how much the boat is wanted. Think,—if a storm should come,—what a difference the presence or absence of that boat would make!"
And the very next day a storm did come. The winds raged, and the waves leaped in fury over the outlying range of rocks known to Old Maxham as "the reef." All through the evening hours matters grew worse and worse, till only a strong man could stand upon the shore, facing the blast. And in the darkness, those who were there believed that they heard an awful cry, as of human beings in the last extremity of danger. One wild wail, and a pause; then another wilder wail, and a longer pause; then a third—and no more. Some said it was only the shrieking of the gale, and others hoped it might be fancy.
"Even if a barque was on the reef, we couldn't have heerd them here," it was declared.
But the older sailors shook their heads, and said that the thing was not impossible, for such a sound had been heard before, when a wreck had taken place, the wind blowing direct from the reef. Nothing could be done, however; for no ordinary small boat could keep afloat in such a sea as was running that night.
And when the morning dawned, and the fury of the wind had grown less, and the frantic waves had died into a sullen swell, fragments of a broken barque were borne in by the next rising tide, and with the fragments came two drowned bodies of sailors, stark and stiff. Only those two. The rest were gone, and the barque itself had vanished.
They were taken up and were reverently buried in the churchyard, and the Church's prayers were read over them, a large crowd having assembled around.
The Vicar officiated, and he used the opportunity to say a few more words upon the subject which lay near his heart. Many words were not needed, for those two drowned men had cried with a loud voice to the people of Old Maxham. But the Vicar could not quite pass the matter by. He looked round with sorrowful eyes as he said,—