This was easier said than done, for honest Bill had no shirt left to look at, except the collar and wristbands, all the rest having been torn clean away.
But as Austin glanced round him he saw other proofs of the wind's force even more convincing than this. Two of the boats had been literally smashed to pieces, the strong-iron davits that held them being twisted like pin-wire. Down in the engine-room the flying open of the furnace doors had flooded the whole room with blazing coal, and four of the tubes had burst at once, scalding several firemen so severely that they had to be carried to the surgeon forthwith.
Suddenly a cry for help was heard from the wheel-house. Three or four brave fellows rushed across the reeling deck at the risk of their lives, and tearing open the door, found one quartermaster lying senseless and bleeding in a corner, while the other, with a broken arm, was actually keeping the wheel steady with the remaining hand and his knee, which he had thrust between the spokes!
But the stout-hearted crew, not a whit daunted, coolly set about repairing damages. The injured men were carried below, the decks cleared of the fragments of wreck, and the coals drawn from the furnaces, into which the firemen, swathed in wet blankets, crept by turns along a plank (relieving one another as the stifling heat overpowered them) to close the flues again by hammering strong wooden plugs into the leaks.
By twelve o'clock the gale was at its height. Even with four men at the wheel, the Arizona could barely hold her own against the tremendous seas that came thundering upon her like falling rocks, and old Herrick himself began to look grave.
"Get out a drag!" shouted the officer of the watch.
The boatswain repeated the order, to the no small amazement of our hero, who, having always associated a drag with the wheel of a coach, was puzzled to imagine how it could be applied to a ship.
But he was not long in finding out. Pieces of timber from the broken boats, worn out sails, old iron, and various odds and ends were hastily gathered into a heap, lashed together with chains, and launched overboard, with two strong hawsers attached. The chains and pieces of iron made the buoyant mass sink just deep enough, to steady the vessel, and keep her head up to the wind, which toward night-fall began to show signs of abating.
Just before darkness set in, a Spanish bark crossed their bows. The storm had left its mark on her upper spars, which were terribly shattered; but the crew, instead of clearing away the wreck, were groaning and praying around a little doll-like image of the Virgin, while their officers vainly urged them to return to their duty.
"Skulkin' lubbers!" growled old Herrick; "they should git what that feller in the song got. D'ye mind it, Frank, my boy?