The men were by this time fairly taken aback and submissive.
Cheyne measured off three fathoms on the line from the place where the line was made fast to his waist, and rapidly rolled on the line a piece of sheet-lead weighing more than half a pound. This he tightened on the line by biting it hard, ascertained that the lead would not slip easily, walked over to the edge of the little quay, and, having told the men who tended the line to pay out freely--in fact, never check it--he dived into the turbulent sea.
CHAPTER XVIII.
[VOLUNTEER II.]
Cheyne had been a careful and intelligent spectator of Bence's failure, and he had learnt two of the great causes of it.
In the first place he had seen that Bence swam at such a distance from the openings as not to receive the full force of the bore, but at the same time to be very much thrown out of his course by the spent water.
In the second place he had noticed that at least half Bence's difficulty arose from the rope he towed getting into these currents, and dragging him still more out of his course.
In both these cases were precious time and enormous labour thrown away. It occurred to Cheyne that both sources of loss could be easily avoided. If the swimmer kept under the absolute shelter of the rocks, close to them as possible where there was a slight backwater, and waited to swim across the open spaces until all the force of the wave had been spent, and the water in front of the opening was still, he would avoid any loss of way owing to the former cause in Bence's case.
If, instead of towing a long slack line after him, he could manage so as to cause the line to sink almost perpendicularly from his waist to a depth below the influence of the water rushing through these openings, then the line, if allowed to run freely out at the shore end, would lie straight behind the swimmer.
Now that he was in the water he struck out for the reef, keeping as close to the northern shore as possible, in order to avoid any direct influence of the currents from the reef, and in order to get the advantage of the backwater, if there should happen to be any.