We could see no one on it as it was towed along. A minute or more passed.
The mast to which we clung rose to the top of a sea, we saw the brig plunge into another. Again we looked, for one instant we saw her stern, and the next she was gone.
We were too far off to hear a cry. The foremast must have been drawn down with her. The boats were securely lashed. Nothing that we could see remained floating. We knew that our late shipmates had perished.
Our own condition was fearful in the extreme. At any moment we might be washed from our hold! Now our head were under water! Now we rose to the top of a sea and looked down into a deep gulf below us.
“Hold on; hold on, Peter,” cried Jim, who was clinging on the mast close to me. “Don’t give up. Here, I’ve cut a piece of rope for you. Lash yourself on with it. I’ll get a piece for myself presently.”
I wanted him to secure himself first, but he insisted that I should take the rope, and I lashed myself with it. He soon afterwards secured himself in the same way. We might thus prolong our lives; but should we be able to hold out till a passing vessel might pick us up? I asked myself.
We were far away from land, and hours, perhaps days, might go by before the mast was seen, and only our dead bodies would be found. We had no food, no fresh water; night was coming on. I did not tell my thoughts to Jim, nor did he say what was passing in his mind; but we tried to cheer each other up. For an instant the clouds broke asunder in the west, and the sun, just as he sank below the horizon, bursting forth, shed a bright glow over the foaming ocean.
“He’ll not be long down,” cried Jim, “and he’ll warm us on t’other side when he rises.”
Jim’s remark did me good. We had cause to hope for the best. The squall which had carried away the brig’s masts was the last of the gale. The wind rapidly fell, and the sea went down, so that in a short time we could keep ourselves almost entirely out of the water. The mast became more quiet. Had we not lashed ourselves to it when we fell asleep as we both did now and then, we might have dropped off. We talked as much as we could, both to keep up our spirits and to prevent ourselves from dozing. Thus the night passed. It seemed long enough, but not so long as I expected. I must have closed my eyes when I heard Jim shout, “A sail! A sail!” and opening them I saw a large ship under all sail about a couple of miles away, standing on a course which we hoped would bring her near us.