“Go, then,” he said, fervently clasping the youth’s hand, “and God be with you. I shall not forget your heroism.”
“I’ll do it, if it’s in the sinoos of a man,” said he, returning the grasp, till the Major’s fingers crunched as if in a vice. And measuring the distance between the beach and the wreck with his eye, he continued— “Many’s the time I’ve swum ten times as far for fun, and though never in quite such a surf, yet often in one a’most as bad.”
By this time his comrades were engaged in fixing one end of the rope around his waist. He felt of it, to see that it held firm, and hitching himself up, he said, with an attempt at jocularity not unusual at such times with men of his class—
“It’s rather a long tail for a man to go to sea with, and beat’s a Chinaman’s dead hollow; but I guess a fellow can manage it. So here goes.”
As he spoke, he ran gayly down into the undertow. For an instant, his comrades looked upon him in silence, but when he turned, on the very edge of the surf, to wave a last farewell, they broke simultaneously into a cheer.
The youth did not wait till the huzza subsided, but, watching his opportunity, plunged into a wave that was just then about to break, and while the tons of water, overwhelming him, rushed roaring and churning up the sands, vanished from sight.
For what seemed an age, the spectators watched and waited, in vain, for his reappearance.
“He is gone already,” said Major Gordon, drawing a deep breath, after this interval. “No, there he is. He comes up buoyant as a cork. See how he takes that second roller!”
It would have excited even the most phlegmatic had they witnessed the gallant manner in which the youth battled his way against that terrible sea. For, during a time, he actually seemed to be about effecting his purpose. It is true that, when forced by temporary exhaustion to ride the incoming billows, he was often swept almost ashore again: but by a few skillful plunges he would regain the ground which he had lost, and even more. Now an intervening billow, towering far towards the sky, would hide him completely from the gaze of his anxious comrades; and often his disappearance would be so prolonged, that the spectators would tremble again for his safety. Now, just when all gave him up for lost, he would shoot into sight once more, rising on the side of another approaching billow, and shaking, as he rose, the water from his hair, like a Newfoundland emerging after a dive. One moment his form would be seen, standing out in bold relief against the polished side of a wave, and the next it would be half concealed amid a whirlwind of foam that rushed over the crest of the breaker.
At one time nearly half the distance between the shore and wreck had been conquered. The worst was apparently over.