146 TKAVEL, ADVENTUKE, AXD SPOKT. 



should be able to preserve long enough to enable 

 us to come up with the stranger. She proved to 

 be beating to windward, and we saw presently that 

 one of her tacks would bring her within hail of us. 

 To see this was to pass at once from despair to 

 confidence. We regarded ourselves as saved, and 

 scarcely heeded the time that must pass before she 

 could come up with us; a time, every minute of 

 which was fraught with peril, that might shut out 

 from us the prospective help. As she drew near, one 

 only fear remained, lest she might pass us unobserved 

 in the obscurity of night ; and so diminutive an 

 object were we, and so little to be expected in that 

 place, that there was some room for the fear. As 

 she neared us we shouted loudly, but the din of 

 the elements was not to be overcome by our puny 

 voices. But on a night like that it was necessary to 

 keep a good look-out, and we knew that she must 

 have watchful eyes peering into the darkness. I had 

 on board a brace of pistols ready charged, which 

 having been stowed away in the locker had been 

 kept dry. We fired one after the other when 

 quite close to the vessel, and succeeded in attracting 

 their notice. We even made out in the murky air, 

 to which our eyes were becoming accustomed, one 

 or two figures of men, who ran forward to see what 

 was the. matter. But the chasse maree held on her 

 way, unheeding. When almost under her bows, we 

 called out to them in agony to heave to and take us 



