PADDY'S LATEST EXPLOIT. 353 



a great sweep round on to the other tack, a few flutter- 

 ing gleams aloft showing that even in that storm they 

 were daring to set some sail. What the manoeuvre 

 meant we knew very well — they had cut adrift from their 

 whale, terrified at last beyond endurance into the belief 

 that Paddy was going to sacrifice himself and his crew 

 in the attempt to lure them with him to inevitable de- 

 struction. The other two did not hesitate longer. The 

 example once set, they immediately followed ; but it was 

 for some time doubtful in the extreme whether their 

 resolve was not taken too late to save them from destruc- 

 tion. We watched them with breathless interest, unable 

 for a long time to satisfy ourselves that they were out of 

 danger. But at last we saw them shortening sail again 

 — a sure sign that they considered themselves, while the 

 wind held in the same quarter, safe from going ashore 

 at any rate, although there was still before them the 

 prospect of a long struggle with the unrelenting ferocity 

 of the weather down south. 



Meanwhile, what of the daring Irishman and his old 

 barrel of a ship ? The fugitives once safe off the land, 

 all our interest centred in the Chance. We watched her 

 until she drew in so closely to the seething cauldron of 

 breakers that it was only occasionally we could distin- 

 guish her outline ; and the weather was becoming so 

 thick and dirty, the light so bad, that we were reluctantly 

 compelled to lose sight of her, although the skipper 

 believed that he saw her in the midst of the turmoil of 

 broken water at the western end of the mighty mass of 

 perpendicular cliff before described. Happily for us, the 

 wind veered to the westward, releasing us from the pro- 

 spect of another enforced visit to the wild regions south 

 of the island. It blew harder than ever ; but being now 

 a fair wind up the Straits, we fled before it, anchoring 



