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There were days when the steamers had to steam full speed ahead in order to keep at their berths; and then the big sailing ships would drag their anchors and come drifting, drifting helplessly towards the shore, and have to fly before the gale if they could, or take their chance of stranding if the water were low, or being battered to bits against the cliffs if the tide were in.
A further sign of immense depression in him was that instead of the creative, it was the critical faculty he exercised, and rather than reply to Franko in his form of speech, he scanned occasional lines and objected to particular phrases. He had clearly exchanged the sanguine for the bilious temperament, and was fast stranding on the rocky shores of prose.
Falsten, and I held a long conversation with the captain about the various incidents of our eventful voyage, speaking of our lost companions, of the fire, of the stranding of the ship, of our sojourn on Ham Rock, of the springing of the leak, of our terrible voyage in the top-masts, of the construction of the raft, and of the storm.
"You mind?" said he, with a laughing look at Gilian, who wished now that he were in the more comfortable atmosphere of the Paymaster's parlour for he was lamentably outside the interests of this group. "You mind?" he pressed again, as if the only victim of that storm and stranding could ever forget!
The torrent of wheat was to be diverted, flowing back upon itself in a sudden, colossal eddy, stranding the middleman, the ENTRE-PRENEUR, the elevator-and mixing-house men dry and despairing, their occupation gone.
They were presently to have something more memorable to record than the loss of a battle or the stranding of a whale. But before we come to this new chapter in the life of Ireland, let us show the continuity of the forces we have already depicted. The old tribal turmoil went on unabated.
"You have done all that depended on you, Dick?" asked Mrs. Weldon. "All," replied the young novice. And at once he made his preparations for stranding the ship. First of all, Mrs. Weldon, Jack, Cousin Benedict and Nan, must put on life-preservers. Dick Sand, Tom and the blacks, good swimmers, also took measures to gain the coast, in case they should be precipitated into the sea.
The risks would be greater during a fog, when the crowd of boats must be liable to collision, stranding on shoals, and losing their way.
Herbert and Gideon Spilett, who were just about to set out hunting, left their guns, Pencroft threw down his ax, and Harding and Neb joining their companions, all rushed towards the scene of action. The stranding had taken place on the beach of Flotsam Point, three miles from Granite House, and at high tide.
They sat long to hear the droning in the stubble and let their thought drift slowly as the ship becalmed. "Some days," said Darrel, "the soul in me is like a toy skiff, tossing in the ripples of a duck pond an' mayhap stranding on a reed or lily.
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