Chapter V tailpiece
CHAPTER VI.
A GOOD NIGHT'S WORK.
bout a quarter past eight one wintry night, a telegram was received at Ramsgate to say that the lightships west of Margate were sending up rockets and firing guns. Owing to the rough sea and strong wind, the Margate lifeboat had been unable to leave the beach, so the coxswain decided to send news of the disaster to Ramsgate, for he knew that the lifeboat there was able, by the help of the tug, to go out in any weather.
The appeal was not made in vain, and in an astonishingly short space of time the tug and lifeboat were on their way to the Goodwins. For a long time they were unable to find out the position of the wreck, and had begun to fear that they had arrived too late, when suddenly the flare of a tar-barrel lighted up the gloom and showed them a large ship hard and fast upon the sands. The water lashed round her in tremendous surges, and every wave seemed to make her tremble from stem to stern. The boatmen at once prepared for action. The tow rope was cast off, the sail hoisted, and the lifeboat plunged quickly through the broken water.
The shipwrecked people saw her coming, and raised a joyful shout. For hours they had been expecting to meet their awful fate, as each wave rolled towards the ship, and they had prepared for death; but when they saw help so near, the love of life was once more roused within them, and they watched the boat with frantic eagerness. The sail was lowered, the anchor thrown overboard, and the cable was slacked down towards the vessel. Unfortunately, the men had miscalculated the distance, and when all the rope was run out, the boat was not within 60 feet of the wreck. Slowly and laboriously the cable had to be hauled in before another attempt could be made to get alongside. The anchor had taken such a firm hold that it required the utmost exertions of the men to raise it, but at last they succeeded. They then sailed closer to the ship, and heaved the anchor overboard again. This time they had judged the distance correctly, and after they had secured a rope from the bow and another from the stern of the ship they were ready to begin work.
The wrecked vessel was the Fusilier, bound from London to Australia with emigrants. She had on board more than a hundred passengers, sixty of whom were women and children. As soon as the lifeboat got near enough, the captain called out to the men in the boat, "How many can you carry?" They replied that they had a steam tug waiting not far off, and said that they would take the passengers and crew off in parties to her. As the boat rose on the crest of a wave, two of the brave fellows caught the ship's ropes and climbed on board. "Who are you?" shouted the captain as they jumped down on to the deck among the excited passengers. "Two men from the life-boat," and at these words the men and women crowded round them, all eager to seize them by the hand, some even clinging to them in the madness of their terror. For a few moments there was a scene of wild excitement on deck, and it took all the authority of the captain to restore order and quietness.
It was then arranged that the women and children should be saved first. It was indeed a task of no little difficulty, for the lifeboat was pitching and tossing in a most terrible manner. At one time she was driven right away from the ship, then back again she came threatening to dash herself to pieces against the side of the vessel, then almost at the same instant she rose on the top of a wave nearly to the level of the ship's deck.
The first woman was brought to the side, but the moment she saw the frightful swirl of waters she shrank back and declared she would rather perish than make the attempt. There was no time to waste on words. She was taken up and handed bodily to two men suspended by ropes over the vessel's side. The boat rose on a wave, and the men stood ready to catch her. At a shout from them, those who were holding the woman let go, but in her fear she clung to the arm of one of the men. In another moment she would have dropped into the sea had not a boatman caught hold of her heel and pulled her into the boat. So one after another were taken off the wreck, and soon the boat was filled. Just as the ropes were being cast off, a man rushed up to the gangway and handed a bundle to one of the sailors. Thinking that it was only a blanket which the man intended for his wife in the boat, he shouted out, "Here, catch this!" and tossed it to one of the men. Fortunately, he succeeded in catching it, and was astonished to hear a baby cry. The next instant it was snatched from his hand by the mother.