Cord and Creese

by James De Mille

But the calm which had set in at midnight, and had become confirmed at dawn, extended itself through the long day. The ship drifted idly, keeping no course, her yards creaking lazily as she slowly rose and fell at the movement of the ocean-undulations. Hour after hour passed, and the day ended, and night came once more.

The Captain did not turn in that night. In anxious expectation he waited and watched on deck, while all around there was the very blackness of darkness. Brandon began to see from the Captain’s manner that he expected something far more violent than any thing which the ship had yet encountered, but, thinking that his presence would be of no consequence, he retired at the usual hour.

The deep, dense calm continued until nearly midnight. The watchers on deck still waited in the same anxious expectation, thinking that the night would bring on the change which they expected.

Almost half an hour before midnight a faint light was seen in the thick mass of clouds overhead—it was not lightning, but a whitish streak, as though produced by some movement in the clouds. All looked up in mute expectation.

Suddenly a faint puff of wind came from the west, blowing gently for a few moments, then stopping, and then coming on in a stronger blast. Afar off, at what seemed like an immeasurable distance, a low, dull roar arose, a heavy moaning sound, like the menace of the mighty Atlantic, which was now advancing in wrath upon them.

In the midst of this the whole scene burst forth into dazzling light at the flash of a vast mass of lightning, which seemed to blaze from every part of the heavens on every side simultaneously. It threw forth all things—ship, sea, and sky—into the dazzled eyes of the watchers. They saw the ebon sky, the black and lustrous sea, the motionless ship. They saw also, far off to the west, a long line of white which appeared to extend along the whole horizon.

But the scene darted out of sight instantly, and instantly there fell the volleying discharge of a tremendous peal of thunder, at whose reverberations the air and sea and ship all vibrated.

Now the sky lightened again, and suddenly, as the ship lay there, a vast ball of fire issued from the black clouds immediately overhead, descending like the lightning straight downward, till all at once it struck the main truck. With a roar louder than that of the recent thunder it exploded; fast sheets of fire flashed out into the air, and a stream of light passed down the entire mast, shattering it as a tree is shattered when the lightning strikes it. The whole ship was shaken to its centre. The deck all around the mast was shattered to splinters, and along its extent and around its base a burst of vivid flame started into light.

Wild confusion followed. At once all the sailors were ordered up, and began to extinguish the fires, and to cut away the shattered mast. The blows of the axes resounded through the ship. The rigging was severed; the mast, already shattered, needed but a few blows to loosen its last fibres.

But suddenly, and furiously, and irresistibly it seemed as though the whole tempest which they had so long expected was at last let loose upon them. There was a low moan, and, while they were yet trying to get rid of the mast, a tremendous squall struck the ship. It yielded and turned far over to that awful blow. The men started back from their work. The next instant a flash of lightning came, and toward the west, close over them, rose a long, white wall of foam. It was the van-guard of the storm, seen shortly before from afar, which was now upon them, ready to fall on their devoted heads.