LOST IN SIGHT OF LAND. 



229 



messages were dearer then than they are now and sent their swiftest runner to telegraph 

 to Ranisgate; and, after all, there was some unfortunate mistake, and fatal delay, and a 

 telegram at last sent for further particulars, which was answered with a demand for 

 urgent speed, and away then flew steamer and life-boat, and they neared the wreck, 

 and rounded to, to send the life-boat in, when some of the boatmen thought they heard an 

 agonising shriek, and others thought it was only the wail of the storm; but they looked, 

 and the great green seas swept over the wreck, turned her right over, and she was seen 



A GKOVP OF LIFE-BOAT MEN. 



no more, and twenty-eight lives went to their account. A piteous New Year's tale it was 

 that was told next morning. A boat's crew got away from the ship soon after she struck, and, 

 battling through the broken seas, made way before the wind to Dover, and they told the 

 story that the lost vessel had picked up a shipwrecked crew, who were thus a second time 

 wrecked, and at the second time lost; and that more of the crew would have come 

 away in the boat, and in other boats, but it was a great risk ; and there was a Deal 

 pilot on board, who pointed out the danger, and said that the Ramsgate life-boat was 

 sure to be o\\t to their rescue, they might be sure of her ; and so they stayed and 

 lighted tar-barrel after tar-barrel, and fired rocket after rocket ; and when the sea 

 washed their signal-fires out and swept the decks, they took to the rigging, and waited 

 for the life-boat; and as they waited, the poor Deal pilot could watch the light on the 



