THE GREAT MARCH GALE 227 



cruelly against your face, it's hard to do more than try 

 and see just ahead of you, but from time to time I looked 

 about me, and occasionally saw just a little dark speck of 

 a smack trying to fight her way off the Dogger and get 

 into deeper and safer water. It was pitiful to see the 

 poor little things struggling for very life, and to know 

 that whatever happened you could do nothing. You 

 were thankful if you kept yourself afloat and the life in 

 your own battered body. 



"Not very far away from me there was a Hullman, 

 which had been working on the Bank. She was making 

 a grand fight for it, but it was awful to see the way the 

 seas were hammering her. 



" I looked again and the Hullman seemed to be falling 

 into the trough of an enormous wave. You know what 

 it is, I dare say, to be out on the Dogger and to look at 

 another smack not far away which has rushed down the 

 crest of a wave and gone right into the hollow. Often 

 enough she sinks so deep and the seas rise up so 

 enormously between you, that you lose sight of her 

 altogether. 



" I lost sight of the Hullman. I looked again towards 

 the spot where I had last seen her, but not a sign of her 

 was left. She'd been smashed bodily by a huge wave, 

 and must have been one of the first of the smacks that 

 foundered. It was no use being scared by such a sight 

 as that. I stuck to the tiller, and all that day we tore 

 towards Hull. We got just a bite or sup now and again 

 to keep us going, but there was no chance of anything 

 like a hot meal and hot food and drink at such times 

 may mean all the difference between winning and losing 

 your fight. We were swept and smothered by the seas, 



