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Updated: May 2, 2025
She was yawing about most frightfully, sheering first to port and then to starboard in a manner which seemed every moment to threaten that she would broach-to.
As Captain Billings could see, the wind was blowing on shore, in the very direction for us to go; and, as the rollers were racing towards the same goal, the only way for us to avoid being swamped by them was to travel at a greater rate forwards than they did, or else we would broach-to in the troughs of the waves, when a boat is apt to get for the moment becalmed, from the intervening wall of water on either side stopping the current of air, and taking the breeze out of her sails.
The sea was rising with extraordinary rapidity, and the various craft soon began to steer wildly, sheering so rankly, first to one side and then to the other, that many of them threatened to broach-to altogether. The Aurora was a very smart little vessel under her canvas, as she now proved by keeping pace with two large ships, one of which lay on her port-bow, and the other on her starboard beam.
But she had a good grip of the water, and with decently careful steering she showed but small inclination to broach-to or do anything else she wasn't wanted to. She might not be a beauty; she might be sluggish as a haystack in a light breeze; but, as Haigh said, this was just her day, and we were not too nervous to take advantage of it.
My only trouble was that, running, as the boat now was, with the wind so far over the starboard quarter, I dared not release my hold upon the tiller for an instant, lest she should broach-to and, possibly, capsize.
But quick as he was he was too late, for the club whizzed through the air and struck the native boy on his right arm. A savage yell of triumph came from the pursuing canoes as their occupants saw the boy go down and the canoe broach-to, and then the leading canoe dashed up alongside that of Maurice and his companion.
I shouted to him to let me know what it all meant, but his attention was so completely absorbed by what was happening below that he had no ears for me; while, as for me, I had my hands quite full with the brig, and dared not release my grasp of the wheel for a single instant lest she should broach-to and get her decks swept, or possibly be dismasted.
Thus assailed, those men seized others with like intent, and an awful struggle filled all that part of the craft. At this dread instant the boat glanced into the white water, shipping so much of the element as nearly to swamp her, and taking so wild a sheer as nearly to broach-to. This last circumstance probably saved her, fearful as was the danger for the moment.
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