“See if you can pick them up with the electric,” is the captain’s order to the second officer, who has just appeared on deck. At the same instant a dazzling flash of white light darts forth from the steamer’s bow, and cuts a gleaming path-way between two solid walls of blackness above the raging waters.
The second officer seizes the handles at the back of the great lamp, and the broad band of light is slowly swept round to the direction from which the cries have come. In another moment it flashes full in the white faces of Breeze McCloud and his companions, sitting in their seine-boat not more than a hundred yards away. The wonderful eye of the search-light has discovered them, and they cover theirs with their hands, or turn away from the unbearable radiance.
“Pull under our lee,” shouts the captain of the steamer through a speaking-trumpet, “and we’ll try and get you aboard.”
It was a difficult task, for the ship rolled so deeply that it would have been unsafe to open her side-ports, and they must be taken aboard over the rail. As the seine-boat lay alongside, it was at one moment on a level with the steamer’s deck, and the next so far below it that her wet side rose like a black wall high above them. Nothing could be done until she was turned, so as to lie head to the wind. Then, one by one, the wrecked men caught the ropes flung to them, fastened them under their arms, and were hauled up to the steamer’s deck, where they were received and pulled on board by the stout arms eagerly out-stretched to aid them. Some of them were buried beneath the huge waves that sprang after them as though furious at being thus robbed of their expected prey and still determined to clutch it. Others were bruised by being swung violently against the iron side of the steamer. At last all of them were safely rescued, and, with the seine-boat towing by a long line astern, the great steamer was again headed on her course.
Was there ever anything so delicious as the hot coffee at once served to them, or so welcome as the plentiful meal that awaited them in the steamer’s mess-room, after they had got into the dry clothes furnished by her crew? Breeze did not think there was. And when, soon afterwards, he found himself in a comfortable bunk, under warm blankets, and dropping to sleep, he felt that he was one of the most fortunate and marvellously cared for boys in the world.
IN ANOTHER MOMENT IT FLASHES FULL IN THE WHITE FACES OF BREEZE McCLOUD AND HIS COMPANIONS.
The steamer that thus furnished the weary fishermen with shelter, safety, and all the comforts of a sailor’s life was one of a line plying between Boston and a southern city, from which she was now bound. Her captain was one of those noble sailors who are never so happy as when rescuing other toilers of the sea from its perils. He told Captain Coffin that, without any definite reason, he had felt impelled to alter his ship’s course half a point to the eastward shortly before their cries had been heard. It was this change of direction that had brought the red light once more into view.
Before morning the gale had so increased in fury that it was not probable their light craft could have lived through it had they not been picked up when they were. As it was, the seine-boat, while towing behind the steamer, was struck soon after daylight by a great sea that capsized it. The next crushed it like an egg-shell, and the broken wreck was cut adrift.
Twenty-four hours later they entered Boston harbor, and the crew of the lost Curlew, after expressing their heart-felt thanks to the captain, passengers, and crew of the steamer, who had done everything in their power to make them comfortable, left her. They made their way at once to the market slip devoted to the use of fishing vessels, where they were sure of finding friends and fellow-townsmen.