. . .it; and before the rain ceased we had each emptied the pint pannikin twice and had filled the broached breaker right up to the edge of its bung-hole. Then we had another drink all round, after which we bathed our smarting, blistered hands in the cooling liquid before emptying it into the sea. The downpour lasted for perhaps twelve minutes; then it ceased as suddenly as it had begun—as suddenly as though a tap had been turned off up aloft—and we had an opportunity once more to look around us. And, glancing instinctively to the westward in the first instance—for that was where we expected the wind to come from—the first thing we saw, in the fast-deepening twilight, was a broad belt of dark water, flecked here and there with white, about a mile distant, and advancing in our direction.

“Hurrah, lads!” I exclaimed, “here comes the breeze—a foul one it is true, but even a foul wind, so long as there is not too much of it, is better than. . . Read More