WltECKED ON THE BEACH. 247 



Yes it is ! there lifting- on the surf ! there, rolling- over ! ' ' Quick ! quick ! form a 

 line ! ' And the brave boatmen grasp each other's hands with iron strength, and form a 

 chain, the lowest of the four or five men at the sea end of the chain being in the 

 water. The waves battle with them, but sturdily they persevere. At last the body is 

 within reach of the seaward man ; he grasps it ; the men are dragged up the beach, and 

 the poor insensible man is carried ashore. Alive or dead? They cannot say; and with 

 a great fear in their hearts they carry him hurriedly up the beach, and soon, to the 

 great joy of all, he gives signs of life, and gradually recovers. 



" In the meanwhile, the poor boatmen on the beach have nothing that they can da 

 but watch their fine boat, which was worth five hundred pounds, being torn and ham- 

 mered to pieces in the surf. Plank after plank is wrenched from her. Now, with a 

 loud crash, she is broken in half ; the two halves part ; the anchor and cable fall through 

 her. They can see part of the forepeak, with one side torn away, floating in the breakers ; 

 soon that also is rent to pieces, and nothing but fragments of the boat float in the surf 

 or are strewn about the beach ; and the boatmen, heavy-hearted, but thankful that they 

 have escaped with their lives, go slowly to their homes to rest for a few hours and recruit their 

 strength, and then be ready to form part of the crew of any other boat, and at the first 

 summons to rush out again to the encounter with the stormiest seas." And that what 

 the men of Deal are par excellence hardy, brave, and skilful the men of our coasts are 

 very generally. 



Sometimes the hovellers are distinctly associated with the life-boat men in their 

 efforts to save life. Gilmore cites a case where a lugger's boat had succeeded in taking 

 a number of men off a wreck, when they themselves were caught in a squall, and were 

 only too glad to make for the life-boat, to which the larger part were transferred. Then 

 came a chapter of difficulties, for neither, steamer nor lugger could be discovered through 

 the fog, which obscured everything within a few yards of them. When they at length 

 reached the Champion lugger, the shipwrecked crew refused to leave the life-boat. They 

 had been as nearly as possible wrecked a second time in the lugger's boat. What a story 

 had these poor men to relate ! 



Their vessel, the Effort, had been beaten about for days in the North Sea previous 

 to grounding on the fatal Goodwins. They hoisted lamps, and were preparing to set 

 a tar-barrel on fire, when their ship, which was very light, rolled from side to side, 

 almost yard-arms under, and then suddenly capsized altogether. "At once," said one of 

 the narrators, " and with difficulty, we made for the weather rigging, and were glad to 

 find that not any of the crew were lost as she fell over. We lashed ourselves to the 

 rigging. We knew, to our great joy, that the tide was falling; had it been rising, we must 

 have very soon been overrun by it, the vessel broken up, and every man of us lost. We 

 were in danger enough as it was, for the brig, soon after she capsized, was caught by 

 the tide, and worked round, with her deck towards the seas; and as the heavy seas 

 broke over and came rushing up the deck, they fell on us with terrible weight, and beat 

 us and crushed us against the ship's rail, so that we were forced to unlash ourselves from 

 the rigging; and what to do we did not know, till one of us said, 'Our only chance is 

 to lash the end of the ropes round our waists, and let go the rigging as the waves 



