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He eased the sloop gently into the wind, at the same time casting off the jib-sheet. "Let go the jib-halyards and come in on the downhaul!" Joe had seen the manoeuver performed the previous night, and so was able to carry it out with fair success. "Now! Over with the mud-hook! Watch out for turns! Lively, now!" The chain flew out with startling rapidity and brought the Dazzler to rest.
He stationed Ned in the standing-room to tend the jib-sheets and mind the centre-board. Two hands were at the cable, and two more at the jib-halyards. "Are you all ready forward?" called the skipper pro tem. of the Sea Foam. "All ready," replied the hands. And Donald waited with intense interest for the gun. Bang. "Let go! Hoist the jib!" cried Donald. The hands forward worked with a will.
I now jumped to the jib-halyards and down-haul, getting that sail reduced; then I half-brailed the spanker; this was done lest my hold on the yard should give way. I can say, that up to this instant, I had not even looked for Marble. So intense had been my apprehensions of missing the wreck, that I thought of nothing else, could see nothing else.
Then Jasper himself belayed the end of the jib-halyards to a stretcher in the rigging, instead of bringing it to the mast, where they belong, at least among British sailors." "I daresay Jasper may have got some Canada notions about working his craft, from being so much on the other side," Pathfinder interposed; "but catching an idee, or a word, isn't treachery and bad faith.
Stand by the jib-halyards!" "Anchor a-weigh, sir!" said Cleats, who was doing duty on the forecastle. "Hoist the jib!" "Up with the jib!" repeated Peaks. As the anchor came up to the hawse-hole, the jib filled, and the vessel began to move. "Cat and fish the anchor!" called the vice-principal; and his order was passed forward. "Cat and fish the anchor!" exclaimed Perth.
It was not long after midnight, when we were wakened in the forecastle by the lion roar of Jermin's voice, ordering a pull at the jib-halyards; and soon afterwards, a handspike struck the scuttle, and all hands were called to take the ship into port.
Some of the ladies "squealed" when the gun went off, but all eyes were immediately directed to the yachts. The Christabel, with a reef in her fore and main sails, was next to the Penobscot; then came the Skylark, the Sea Foam, and the Phantom. Before the gun was fired, the captain had stationed a hand in each yacht at the cable, and others at the jib-halyards and down-hauls.
"Watch her, boys. Now she's whooping look at her come!" And she was coming. Her windward side was lifted so high that her bottom planks could be seen. Her oil-skinned crew were crowded forward. There were men at the fore-halyards, at jib-halyards, at the down-hauls, and a group were standing by the anchor. Two men were at the wheel. She bit into it. There was froth at her mouth.
This one great sea changed the aspect of affairs suddenly as the flash of a gun. Three minutes later the same wave overtook the Spray and shook her in every timber. At the same moment the sheet-strop parted, and away went the main-boom, broken short at the rigging. Impulsively I sprang to the jib-halyards and down-haul, and instantly downed the jib.
The first reach brought her to the high cliff near the hotel, and after a "short leg," he fetched the anchorage off the wharf. "Let go your jib-halyards!" shouted Leopold. "Hard down the helm! Let go the anchor!" The Orion swung round to her cable, and the pilot went aft.
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