Cradock Nowell, Vol. 2 (of 3)

and glad to be quit of the mischief. For a minute or two, the cloud–curtain lifted over St. Alban?s Head, and a narrow bar of

tuous leap and roar, and no change of direction, and work to the south–west gradually, blowing harder until it got there. The sea was not very heavy yet, when they went out to look at it; the ra

ed Latin, as a matter of course, when he met an Oxford man; "a

s no ship in sight; for, unless I?m much mistaken-run,

slip away, for he knew that his father would be wild about him; he had taken his drenched hat

upon us for at least a generation. And we are not yet in the worst of it. God grant there be no unfortunate ship making for the Needles. All our boa

ay, as Hengistbury Head is the western. The Isle of Wight and the Needle Rocks protect this bay from the east wind?s power, but a due south wind brings in the sea, and a south–west the Atlantic. Off this coast we see at times those strange floating or rising islands known by the name of the "Shingles;" which sometimes stay above water so long,

ed with the cross–tide from St. Helen?s, combs and pants out into Christchurch Bay, above the floodmark of two hours sin

ling and howling, as they had done to a thousand tempests, found that outcry go for nothing, and with it went themselves. Seven hundred towers of Nature?s building showed their roots to the morning. The old moon expired at O·32; and many a gap the new moon found, where its mother threw p

id, with a crash, about ten o?clock, scattering Pell?s tobacco–jars, and after they had made it good with books and boxes and a rug, so that the wind was filtered through it, John Rosedew and his curate sat on a couple of hard old Windsors, watching the castle of Hurst. Thence would come the signal flash, if any hapless bark should be seen driving over the waters. There they

was flying, when the faint gleam of a gun at sea was answered by artillery?s flash from the walls of old Henry the Eighth. Bo

, Pell? Have

e to the right: dead i

Father pity our brot

ittle cottage was partly sheltered by an elbow of the cliff; otherwise it would have been flying up the bunney long

though none could hear him; "but I shall be

nt on alone. For it was John?s especial business; he had procured the lifeboat, chosen the crew, and kept the accounts; and he

ed, "and a good deal perhaps in–do

his weight, like a quoit, against the wind; each stopping and crouching at every tenth yard, as the blast irresistible broke on them. Crusted with hunks of froth pell–mell, like a storm of eggs on the hustings, drenched by

and to the heaven that vexed it. As a strong man in his wrath accepts his wife?s endorsement, so the surges took the minor passion of a fierce spring–tide, rolled it in their own, and scorned the flat land they looked down upon. Tush, the combing of their crests was bigger than any town there. On they came, too grand to be hurried even by the storm that roused them; each had a quarter of a mile to himself, and who sho

omen, clustering, clinging, cowering from the great white grave beneath them. As she laboured, reeled, and staggered up to the storm–rent heavens, and then plunged down the yawning chasm, every attitude, every gesture of terror, love, despai

numbered moments coming. Round him many a sturdy boatman, gazing, listening, rubbing his eyes, wondering about the wives and children of the brave men there. The great disaster imminent was known all over the village, and all who dared to cross the gale had crept, u

ective," fifty years old and upward, with the lenses cracked and rattling, and fungoid tufts in the object–glass. Nevertheless, each man would swear th

cried Pell, the chief interpreter,

t?" asked a dozen

g into smoother water. They?re in the und

ely when once they mounted the wave–crest; but two or three minutes might save them. With eight hands jamming the helm up, and the tough canvas tugging and bellying, the ship, with the aid of the undertow, plunged heavily to windward. All knew that the ship herself was d

the people on shore had feared. The sea broke bodily over her, and she staggered back from the blow, and shook through every timber, then leaped and lurched down the terrible valley, but still, with the good sail holding. She was under noble seamanship, that was clear to every one, and herself a noble fabric.

ation, and the lungs of the gale for the moment were panting, just as she toppe

he ocean. Beam–end on she clomb the mountain, heeling over heavily, showing to the shore her deck–seams,-even the companion–fin

n?t hang there two minutes. Out with the boats

d, and his face of the deepest plum colour, roared to windward his whirlwind of oaths up

everence, mon? It?s an unco thing for an auld mon like you to swear at your mates in their

and to have fifty pounds in the savi

ous fellow! I can see him there holding on by the stanchion, giving his

him to shift the glass a bit. He was just the

nd the women hoisted in first. Give them three cheers, men, though they can?t hear you! Three cheers, if you are Engl

eks, and were blown into the eyes of old

see. What magnificent management! That man ought to command a fleet. Two of them off for Christchurch Harbour; away, away, while the wind lulls

gain. And there?s none with the sense to mutiny on

t it is. There is only room for one more, and not one of those three will take it. Two white–haired men and a girl. Life against honour with the old men; and what is life compared with it? Both resolved not to stir a peg; now they join to make the girl go. Her father has got her in his arms to pitch her int

said Jacob, curtly, t

der, Captain Roberts. C

ith the Aliwal, and eve

. "You?ve seed a many good craft, pilot, but never one as could

ave Pell; "in five minute

y to the eastward first, now she is in the tide again, specially with this gale o

back in the eddy which had saved so many lives there. This has nothing to do with the "double tide;" that comes after high–water. As the good ship traced the track of death,

er–beaten eyes, as he watched his death roll towards him; though the gazers fancied that one tear rose, perhaps at the thought of his family just coming down–stairs at Lymington. The military man beside him faced his death quite differently; perhaps with even less of fear, but with more defiance, broken, every now and then, by anguish for his daughter. He had not learned to fear the Lord, as those men do who go do

rms around his neck, and fondly, sadly, kissed him. Meanwhile the ship–captain turned away, and thought of Susy Roberts. Suddenly he espied a life–belt washed into the scuppers. He ran for

r," cried the oracular Jacob; "sta

shed on the stones, and the raging sea swept her from taffrail to bowsprit, rolled her over, pitched her across, and broke her back in two moments. The shock rang through the roar of billows, as if a nerve of the earth w

ell; "give me something to feel, m

led Octavius Pell up in the manner of a cod–fish, and he was so bruised and stupefied, that he could not tell what he had gone for. They only saw floating timber and gear, and wreck of ever

s to make more widows. The sea leaped at those gallant strong men; there were five on either cable; it leaped at them as the fiery furnace leaped on the plain of Dura. It struck the two ropes into one with a buffet, as a lion?s paw shatters a cobwe

f waves broke the full brunt of it. But there no man, unless he were most quick of eye and foot, might stand without great peril. For scarcely a single billow broke, but what, in the first rebound and toss, two churning humm

, and lay one instant motionless. There was no rope there, and the men hung back; John Rosedew cried "Shame!" and ran for it; but they joined hands across and stopped him. Before they could look round again, some one had raised the body. 'Twas young Bob Garnet, and in his arms lay the maiden se

curdle of the change was. Then Bob, swept many a fathom in–shore, but griping still that senseless thing, that should either live or die with him-Bob, who could swim as well or better than he could climb a tree, but felt that he and his load were only dolls for the wave to dandle-down he went, after showing his heels, and fought the deadly outrush. None but Nature?s pet would have thought of, none but the favoured of God could have done, it. He felt the back–wave tugging at him, he felt that he was going; if another billow broke on him, it was all up with his work u