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When the collision of the two vessels took place, the Windsor Castle, conned so as not to run down the pirate, but to sheer alongside, stove in the bulwarks of the other, and carried away her top masts, which, drawn to windward by the pressure on the back-stays, fell over towards the Windsor Castle, and, entangling with her rigging, prevented the separation of the two vessels.
It was at this moment, and Barnaby True was holding to the back-stays, when a sudden, prolonged flash of lightning came after a continued space of darkness. So sharp and heavy was this shaft that for a moment the night was as bright as day, and in that instant occurred that which was so remarkable that it hath afforded the title of this story itself.
In this operation they always begin at the mast-head and work down, tarring the shrouds, back-stays, standing parts of the lifts, the ties, runners, etc., and go out to the yard-arms, and come in, tarring, as they come, the lifts and foot-ropes. Tarring the stays is more difficult, and is done by an operation which the sailors call "riding down."
I saw the bowsprit sweeping across our deck, tearing the mainsail as it did so, and carrying away back-stays and other rigging. Dick was shouting out, "What has happened? What are we going to do?" "I hope to get rid of this craft!" cried Captain Truck, who having seized an axe, followed by the rest of the crew, was cutting away at the stranger's bowsprit rigging.
During the night, and also all the 11th, the volcano was exceedingly troublesome, and made a terrible noise, throwing up prodigious columns of fire and smoke at each explosion, which happened every three or four minutes; and, at one time, great stones were seen high in the air. Besides the necessary work of wooding and watering, we struck the main-top-mast to fix new trestle-trees and back-stays.
A somewhat strong swell of the sea would certainly submerge the "Waldeck" in a few moments. The brig's deck had been swept from one end to the other. There was nothing left except the stumps of the mainmast and of the mizzen-mast, both broken off two feet above the scuttles, and which had fallen in the collision, carrying away shrouds, back-stays, and rigging.
There's for'ard and back-stays, and shrouds, all's one as aboard here; the only difference is that the lanyards are a little looser, so as to give a man more play for his head, than it might be safe to give to a mast.
Towards morning it increased to such a pitch that one of the back-stays of the foremast gave way. The result was that the additional strain thus thrown on the other stays was too much for them. They also parted, and the fore-top-mast, snapping short off with a report like a cannon-shot, went over the side, carrying the main-topgallant-mast and all its gear along with it.
Some got girt-lines up for riding down the stays and back-stays, and others tarred the shrouds, lifts, etc., laying out on the yards, and coming down the rigging. We overhauled our bags and took out our old tarry trowsers and frocks, which we had used when we tarred down before, and were all at work in the rigging by sunrise.
"If you'd been on the poop an hour or too ago, you'd ha' seen more on it! Now, there's all our marines, their back-stays have had a fresh pull since they were launched, and, as for their captain, I'll warrant you, he had a luff upon luff!" "I've heard the carpenter overhauling them matters," remarked Sam Wad, another quarter-gunner, "and he chalked it all out by the square and compass.
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