Our chainplates,
strong fastenings, and clenched bolts, drew like pliant wires, shrouds and
stays were torn away like the summer gossamer, and our masts and spars,
crackling before his fury like dry reeds in autumn, were blown clean out
of the ship, over her bows, into the sea.
Had we shown a shred of the strongest sail in the vessel, it would have
been blown out of the bolt--rope in an instant; we had, therefore, to get
her before the wind, by crossing a spar on the stump of the foremast, with
four men at the wheel, one watch at the pumps, and, the other clearing the
wreck. But our spirits were soon dashed, when the old carpenter, one of
the coolest and bravest men in the ship, rose through the forehatch, pale
as a ghost, with his white hairs streaming straight out in the wind. He
did not speak to any of us, but clambered aft, towards the capstan, to
which the Captain had lashed himself.
"The water is rushing in forward like a mill--stream, sir; we have either
started a but, or the wreck of the foremast has gone through her bows,
for she is fast settling down by the head."
"Get the boatswain to father a sail then, man, and try it over the leak;
but don't alarm the people, Mr Kelson."
The brig was, indeed, rapidly losing her buoyancy, and when the next heavy
sea rose ahead of us, she gave a drunken sickening lurch, and pitched
right into it, groaning and trembling in every plank, like a guilty and
condemned thing in the prospect of impending punishment.
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