The advice was more than useless; I was holding on to the seat tightly enough to have left my finger-prints on it. I felt a violent shock, as if the bottom of the boat had raked a bed of shingle. The pilot passed rapidly across me and jumped into the sea. I did not in the least understand this evolution, but, on getting up, I caught sight of him standing up to his chest in the water, dragging the boat towards him by a rope. Fifteen paces from us was the cliff. I had a great mind to jump down beside my man, but he realised my intention and sang out—
"No, no; stay still!... We are just in."
Indeed, the first wave pushed the boat so near to the strand that it ran aground.
"Now," said the pilot, coming towards me, "get on to my back."
"What for?"
"To prevent your getting wet."
The precaution was good, but came a little too late in the day seeing I was already soaked through like a sponge.
"Thanks for your thoughtfulness," I said, "but you need not take the trouble." And I leapt into the sea.
At that moment came a wave which went right over my head.
"Capital!" I said, "now my bath is complete!... Oh! what a confounded idiot I am to take such trips as this when there is no occasion to do so at all! Oh!..."