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Updated: June 1, 2025
"Now, my lads, over to the lee guns, and fire as they bear, when we round to. Hands by the lee head-braces, and jib-sheet, stretch along the weather braces. Quarter-master abaft, tend the boom-sheet. Port hard, Swinburne."
She surged up into the wind, her canvas flapping so furiously that it threatened to shake the mast out of her; her lee- gunwale appeared above the surface, and placing my feet against the tiller I pressed it gradually over, helping her round while stopping her way as little as possible; a sea rushed up and struck her on the port- bow, sending her head well off on the other tack, the jib-sheet was promptly hauled over, the mainsail filled, and as we hurriedly scrambled over to the other side of the deck and secured ourselves anew with lashings round our waists, the "Mouette" plunged forward on the larboard tack, looking well up to windward and heading about due north.
I put up my hand, and I'll be shot if it wasn't the foremast, jib-sheet and all, of the old weather-cock on the north gable of the Shackford house! Here you are!" and the speaker tossed the broken mast, with the mimic sails dangling from it, into Durgin's lap. A dead silence followed, for there wa felt to be something weirdly significant in the incident. "That's kinder omernous," said Mr.
The little hooker became lively and began to pull at her cable, as though impatient to be off, the moment that the hands tailed on to the throat and peak-halliards of her immense mainsail, and proceeded to hoist away; and when, having set the sail which, by the way, was beautifully cut, and stood as flat as a board we slipped, and hauled aft the jib-sheet, she heeled to the pressure of the wind as though preparing to spring, and, with a little swirl of water about her sharp stem as she paid off, proceeded to gather way, and the next moment was sheering through the smooth water of the harbour like a hungry dolphin in pursuit of a shoal of flying-fish.
Captain Staunton stood at the tiller, intently watching the onward rush of the mountainous seas as they came swooping down with upreared threatening crests upon the launch. Presently, as the boat fell off a trifle from the wind and the main-sail filled, he gave the order to "let draw the jib-sheet."
Slack out slack out all it will go; the wind is nearly dead aft. Ease off the jib-sheet, Jack. That is it. Now she is walking along." The motion was smooth and easy now. The waves were much higher than in the shelter of the bay, but they were running easily and regularly, in nearly the same line the boat was following.
The schooner's head came up into the wind, the jib-sheet blocks rattled idly and the booms swung lazily across the deck, just grazing the ears of Blue Blazes. How long the roan might have held the deck had not his thirst been greater than his hate cannot be told. Water was what he needed most, for his throat seemed burning, and just overside was an immensity of water. So he leaped.
Everything was confusion; the captain, springing into the first boat, bade his men follow, leaving, beside Harry, but two worthless fellows, who hardly knew a skysail from a jib-sheet, in charge of the ship. Harry kept his eye upon the boats for hours; he perceived they were evidently having a hard time of it.
From this elevation I again looked out, instinctively shading my eyes under my hand, and in another moment I had again caught sight of the object, and not only so, but had also detected an intermittent flashing, as of the moonlight off the wet blades of oars. "A boat! a boat!" I shouted, in the fulness of my delight. "Hurrah, lads! we have one of them at last! Let draw the jib-sheet!
The wind was now right aft, and we soon came upon the line of the bird, which appeared to be a crested crane. The boom was topped-up in a moment, the jib-sheet let fly, and the boat's nose ran crashing through the sedges which in this part fringed the bank. The crane had alighted on the very summit of a straight and lofty tree, and there she sat, unconscious of the danger at hand.
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