The puffs were heavy but short; there was nothing to be called a squall, no danger to the ship, and scarce more than usual to the doubtful spars.  All hands were on deck in their oilskins, expecting breakfast; the galley smoked, the ship smelt of coffee, all were in good humour to be speeding eastward a full nine; when the rotten foresail tore suddenly between two cloths and then split to either hand.  It was for all the world as though some archangel with a huge sword had slashed it with the figure of a cross; all hands ran to secure the slatting canvas; and in the sudden uproar and alert, Tommy Hadden lost his head.  Many of his days have been passed since then in explaining how the thing happened; of these explanations it will be sufficient to say that they were all different and none satisfactory; and the gross fact remains that the main boom gybed, carried away the tackle, broke the mainmast some three feet above the deck and whipped it overboard.  For near a minute the suspected foremast gallantly resisted; then followed its companion; and by the time the wreck was cleared, of the whole beautiful fabric that enabled them to skim the seas, two ragged stumps remained.

In these vast and solitary waters, to be dismasted is perhaps the worst calamity.  Let the ship turn turtle and go down, and at least the pang is over.  But men chained on a hulk may pass months scanning the empty sea line and counting the steps of death’s invisible approach.  There is no help but in the boats, and what a help is that!  There heaved the Currency Lass, for instance, a wingless lump, and the nearest human coast (that of Kauai in the Sandwiches) lay about a thousand miles to south and east of her.  Over the way there, to men contemplating that passage in an open boat, all kinds of misery, and the fear of death and of madness, brooded.

A serious company sat down to breakfast; but the captain helped his neighbours with a smile.

“Now, boys,” he said, after a pull at the hot coffee, “we’re done with this Currency Lass, and no mistake.  One good job:  we made her pay while she lasted, and she paid first rate; and if we were to try our hand again, we can try in style.  Another good job:  we have a fine, stiff, roomy boat, and you know who you have to thank for that.  We’ve got six lives to save, and a pot of money; and the point is, where are we to take ’em?”

“It’s all two thousand miles to the nearest of the Sandwiches, I fancy,” observed Mac.

“No, not so bad as that,” returned the captain.  “But it’s bad enough:  rather better’n a thousand.”

“I know a man who once did twelve hundred in a boat,” said Mac, “and he had all he wanted.  He fetched ashore in the Marquesas, and never set a foot on anything floating from that day to this.  He said he would rather put a pistol to his head and knock his brains out.”