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Looking back for an instant, all hands saw the appalling sight of the vessel they had left turn on her side and sink to the bottom of the sea. With colours flying, with proud and thankful hearts they reach Broadstairs, whence I received the coxswain's telegram 'Crew all saved; sprung foremast. R. Roberts.
The British red ensign was flying proudly from her peak, in token of 'rescued crew on board'; and as the men jumped out, I grasped the brave coxswain's hand and said, 'Well done, Roberts! And as I saw the rescued crew and their gallant deliverers, 'God bless you, my lads, well done! The words will be echoed in many a heart, but could my readers have seen the faces of the lifeboatmen, weather-beaten and incrusted with salt, or watched them, as they staggered wearied but rejoicing up the beach could they have knelt in the thanksgiving service which I held that morning with the rescued crew, and have heard their graphic version of the grim reality and how that the living God had in His mercy stretched out His arm and saved them from death on the Goodwins, they would better understand, better, far, than words of mine can bring it home how splendid a deed of mercy and of daring was that day done by the coxswain and the crew of the North Deal lifeboat .
This is all very peaceful and picturesque to write about now, but at the time I was in a motor boat that had left Mahommerah to take me for a run and it had broken down and seemed unlikely to start again in spite of all the coxswain's efforts. Consequently we were drifting about on the stream and likely to be swept down by the ebb tide.
"We'll go forward, Herrick," said my companion; and he stepped over the thwarts into the coxswain's place, and I sat by him, watching alternately for birds, junks, and creeks, up which the latter might lie. "Begin shootee soon," said Ching rather anxiously. "Why?" "Velly muchee sail boat behind think why we come."
"Keep up your spirits, dear Peggy," said Nell, in that sweet, cosy tone if we may say so which played such havoc in Bob's bosom at the time when she was known as the coxswain's bride. "I feel sure that your dear husband will return to us.
One I recognized for the coxswain's, Israel Hands, that had been Flint's gunner in former days. The other was, of course, my friend of the red night-cap. Both men were plainly the worse of drink, and they were still drinking, for even while I was listening, one of them, with a drunken cry, opened the stern window and threw out something, which I divined to be an empty bottle.
With these I came on deck, put down my own stock behind the rudder-head, and well out of the coxswain's reach, went forward to the water-breaker, and had a good, deep drink of water, and then, and not until then, gave Hands the brandy. He must have drunk a gill before he took the bottle from his mouth. "Ay," said he, "by thunder, but I wanted some o' that!"
But before this dramatic conclusion, the Kingsdown lifeboat slipped her anchor, to which she never could have got back, and setting her mast and double-reefed storm-foresail, ran away before the wind through the 'heavy boiling surf' on the Goodwins. These are the coxswain's own written words, and I can only repeat they are below the grim reality.
Deacon's head became clear. None of the physical torture he had felt in the past mile was now registered upon his consciousness. No thought but that of impending victory! "Less than a quarter of a mile, boys. In the stretch. Now my God!" Following the coxswain's broken exclamation, Deacon felt an increased resistance upon his blade. "Eh?" "Innis has carried away his oarlock."
I can't hit the name on 't; well, you get me a bottle of wine, Jim this here brandy's too strong for my head." Now, the coxswain's hesitation seemed to be unnatural, and as for the notion of his preferring wine to brandy, I entirely disbelieved it. He wanted me to leave the deck so much was plain; but with what purpose I could in no way imagine.
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