"Will not bear our enemy's boats,
But suck them up to the top-mast."
Bravely, however, keeps on that labouring barque. One moment she seems engulphed in the boiling waters, and the mist rolls over the spot where her hull was last tossing. The next she is trembling upon the crested wave, and again about to be hurled from its summit into the waters beneath.
One eye there is, on board, which seems especially to watch over her,—an eye which calmly scans every part around, watches every cord of her rigging, and rectifies every mishap consequent upon the violence of the gale.
Meanwhile, on the waist, the deck, the poop, are to be seen, besides the sailors who work the vessel, lying, sitting, and holding on by the ropes, the forms of fierce and bearded men, clad in the buff leathern dress which formed the usual costume of warriors of the period, their half-armour being doffed during their voyage along the coast.
Suddenly the eye of the chief, as the driving rain for the moment seems to subside, catches sight of a range of white foam. Another and another follow after, till they seem to overtake each other, and mingle in a perfect cauldron of boiling sea.
Then his voice sounds amidst the roar of winds and waters—the sails flap—the cordage strains—and every eye looks anxious, and every heart beats quicker; for that moment is to decide whether the living, and warlike freightage, are to ride safely past the gulf, or to be sucked down amidst the depths of the awful Goodwins.
As the chief mariner leaps upon the bulwark of the vessel, and, grasping the rigging, looks out upon the boiling sea, a slight and graceful youth has emerged from the cabin, and placed himself beside him.
"We are in peril," said he, in a low voice; "these are the fatal sands you thought you had safely passed an hour ago."
But the mariner for the moment heeds not the question of his superior. His whole attention is given to his craft, and the horrible depths she is every minute apparently about to be engulphed in.
It was an awful moment for one so young and delicate-looking as that boy. Yet his cheek blanches not at the prospect of a death so fearful. He clings to the slippery ropes, and awaits the event with a courage worthy of one of firmer frame and maturer years; whilst the vessel, dashing amidst the waves, still holds stoutly on.