WHALING VOYAGE. 285 
observe its wild forms dancing in the air to its own wild 
sounds — but there was destruction to us in it, death 
was in its foaming embrace ! Around its base horrible 
sharks were prowling for the unfortunate victims of the 
troubled waters. We could just observe a breach of 
continuity in the “ rollers/ 5 — it was the passage I had 
seen and had spoken of ; we appeared to be approaching 
it rapidly, more so than the strength of our oars could 
impel us ; there appeared to be a rapid current setting in 
through the opening— the crisis approached ! The men 
simultaneously ceased rowing forward, and backed their 
oars to prevent themselves and boat from being whirled 
to destruction ; the passage was narrow, in its centre 
there was no surf that we could perceive in the dark- 
ness,— but on each side there were tremendous pillars of 
raging foam. We all remained in doubt what to do, 
the darkness was still extreme, it appeared impossible 
to pass through without getting into contact with the 
sides of the channel, which looked like a marble sepul- 
chre, opening its jaws to receive us. A few bright 
flashes of lightning, succeeded by terrific peals of thunder, 
and which were followed by a howling blast of wind, 
left us no choice ; the boat was now drawn by the current 
and impelled by the furious wind and waves into the 
pass. In an instant we were surrounded by the foam- 
ing waters, far above our heads— they appeared about to 
overwhelm us— there was a death-like stillness amongst 
us, each grasping in an agony of mind some part of 
the boat. At this moment a light was held out by an 
invisible hand, we could perceive our situation more 
