During the next three weeks nothing untoward occurred. The Golden Hope pursued her course over a seemingly boundless ocean, with never a sail to break the skyline, till, when, according to our reckoning, we were within ninety miles of Land's End, I was aroused just after midnight by the shout:
"A light on the starboard bow."
Gleaming faintly through the darkness, I could distinguish a small column of flame, apparently ten miles away, which faded and waxed stronger at close intervals.
"What d'ye make of it, sir?" asked 'Enery, as he and Captain Jeremy mounted the poop ladder to get a better view of the mysterious light.
"Make of it? Why, it can be but one thing. 'Tis a ship on fire."
CHAPTER XXXI
The Burning Ship
Within an hour or so we had approached sufficiently near to the conflagration to prove the truth of Captain Jeremy's assertion.
It was a large vessel burning from bow to stern, the flames mounting to a tremendous height and casting a lurid glow on a thick column of smoke that blew miles to leeward. The masts and spars of the ship were still standing, though licked by the devouring fire, while her double line of ports shone like a line of gigantic glow-worms.
Even at the distance we were from her we could hear the crackling of the burning woodwork, and the subdued roar of the flames as they issued from the bowels of that floating inferno.