At Last, Patagonia ! 3 



save myself, or else perish with them in that awful 

 white surf. But one other person, more experienced 

 than myself, and whose courage took another and 

 better form, was also near and listening. He was 

 the first engineer a young Englishman from New- 

 castle-on-Tyne. Seeing the men making for the 

 boat, he slipped out of the engine-room, revolver in 

 hand, and secretly followed them ; and when the 

 mate gave that order, he stepped forward with the 

 weapon raised, and said in a quiet but determined 

 voice that he would shoot the first man who should 

 attempt to obey it. The men slunk away and 

 disappeared in the gloom. In a few moments more 

 the passengers began streaming out on to the deck 

 in a great state of alarm ; last of all the old cap- 

 tain, white and hollow-eyed from his death-bed, 

 appeared like a ghost among us. He had not been 

 long standing there, with arms folded on his chest, 

 issuing no word of command, and paying no atten- 

 tion to the agitated questions addressed to him by 

 the passengers, when, by some lucky chance, the 

 steamer got off the rocks and plunged on for a 

 space through the seething, milky surf; then, very 

 suddenly, passed out of it into black and com- 

 paratively calm water. For ten or twelve minutes 

 she sped rapidly and smoothly on ; then it was 

 said that she had ceased to move, that we were 

 stuck fast in the sand of the shore, although no 

 shore was visible in the intense darkness, and to me 

 it seemed that we were still moving swiftly on. 

 There was no longer any wind, and through the 



B 2 



