About midnight this fearful gale was evidently at its worst. The sea was then making a clean breach over the ship from fore to aft. The darkness was intense; hardly any light was there at all from the sky, save now and then a bright gleam of lightning that lit up mast, rigging, and shrouds, and the pale faces of the men as they clung in desperation to bulwark or stay.
Each lightning flash was followed by a peal of thunder that sounded high above even the incessant roaring of the wind.
Surely it was every one for himself now, and God for all who put their trust in Him.
It was probably about five bells in the middle-watch, the hatches being firmly battened down, when Ransey Tansey crept under the tarpaulin that covered the after companion, and lowered himself down as well as the terrible motion of the ship permitted him. He staggered into the saloon.
A light was burning in his father’s state-room, the light of a candle hung in gimbals.
Towards the door he groped his way, hoping against hope that he would find his little sister asleep and well.
“O Jane, are you here?” he said; “so glad.”
Janeira rose as he entered, clinging to the edge of the upper bunk in the endeavour to steady herself.
“Iss, I’se heah, sah. Been praying heah all de night to de good Lawd to deliber us. Been one big night ob feah, sah. But de sweet child, she go to sleep at last.”
“Did she cry much?”