The first stroke of the hurricane had been, as is generally the case, the worst; for about half an hour it had blown with frightful and disastrous fury, as has already been described, after which it lulled somewhat, and then had again steadily increased. Accordingly, when Captain Leicester went on deck at noon, he found the gale still gathering strength, the sea higher than ever, and the sky looking more threatening than he remembered to have ever before seen it.
The ship was scudding under bare poles, and behaving capitally, too; but George saw that if the sea rose much higher there would be great danger of being “pooped;” so he—like the people on board the unfortunate Princess Royal—roused out a new foresail and, with very great difficulty, got it bent and set, reefed. This sail dragged the little barque along at a tremendous pace; and from that time there was no further danger of her being “pooped” or overrun by the sea.
On the third day the gale broke; and by sundown the weather had so far moderated as to permit of the Aurora being brought to the wind and hove-to, a manoeuvre which George was most anxious to accomplish, since the ship had, for over seventy-two hours, been running to the eastward, or directly away from her port, at the rate of some ten knots an hour, giving her over seven hundred miles of extra distance to make up. The Aurora remained hove-to during the whole of that night; but at eight bells next morning she made sail under single-reefed topsails and courses; stretching away to the northward and westward on the port tack. She continued on this tack all day; and went about at the end of the second dog-watch, George’s object being to work his way back to the spot, as nearly as possible, where the fleet had separated, and there wait two or three days if need be, in the hope of falling in with the bulk of them again.
Captain Leicester had of course taken full advantage of the return of fine weather to repair damages; the crew had been busy during the whole day getting two new topgallant-masts aloft and rigging them, bending new sails in place of those split or blown away, and so on; the Aurora was consequently, when night fell, all ataunto once more; and a stranger looking at her, would, except for the new look of some of the spars and canvas, never have suspected that she had had her wings clipped.
At nightfall she was standing to the southward and westward on the port tack, under every stitch of canvas that would draw; the wind was failing fast; the sea had long since ceased to break; there was now only an occasional white fleecy comb to be seen on the crests of the waves; and the ship was gliding gently along, with a slow, steady, rhythmical rising-and-falling motion over the long heavy swell, at the rate of some five knots in the hour. The skipper was in excellent spirits at having escaped so well and so cheaply from the fury of the hurricane; and he remained on deck until midnight, chatting with Mr Bowen, the chief mate.
The relief-watch had just been called, and George was waiting to accompany the mate below when his attention was suddenly attracted by a curious appearance in the sky to windward. It was still cloudy; and, low down on the horizon and about two points on the weather bow, he noticed that the clouds were lighter and brighter in tint than anywhere else.
“Look, Bowen,” he exclaimed, “do you see that peculiar-looking cloud away there on the horizon, just over our cat-head? What is the meaning of it?”
The mate looked in the direction indicated; and his more mature experience at once suggested an explanation.
“Looks to me,” he said, “as if there was something afire over there. Here, you Tom,” to a lad belonging to the relief-watch, who had just come on deck, “slip up as far as the fore-topmast cross-trees, and see if you can see anything out of the common away there on the weather bow.”
“Ay, ay, sir,” answered the lad; and in another moment he was dancing nimbly up the fore-rigging; his form just dimly discernible in the dark shadow of the sails.