slumbers.  His next effort was to free himself from his heavy laced boots, which greatly encumbered him, and in which he succeeded by the aid of his knife.  He now saw Lowestoft’s high Lighthouse, and could occasionally discern the tops of the cliffs beyond Garlestone on the Suffolk coast.  The swell of the sea drove him over the Cross Sand Ridge, and he then got sight of a buoy, which, although it told him his exact position, ‘took him rather aback,’ as he had hoped he was nearer the shore.  It proved to be the chequered buoy, St. Nicholas’ Gate, off Yarmouth, and opposite his own door, but distant from the land four miles.  And now again he held counsel with himself, and the energies of his mind seem almost superhuman; he had been five hours in the water, and here was something to hold on by; he could have even got upon the buoy, and some vessel might come near to pick him up, and the question was, could he yet hold out four miles?  ‘But,’ said he, ’I knew the night air would soon finish me, and had I stayed but a few minutes upon it, and then altered my mind, how did I know that my limbs would again resume their office?’ He found the tide was broke; it did not run so strong; so he abandoned the buoy, and steered for the land, towards which, with the wind from the eastward, he found he was now fast approaching.  The last trial of his fortitude was now at hand, for which he was totally unprepared, and which he considered (having the superstition of a sailor) the most difficult of any he had to combat.  Soon after he left the buoy, he heard just above his head a sort of whiffing sound, which his imagination conjured into the prelude to the ‘rushing of a mighty wind,’ and close to his ear there followed a smart splash in the water, and a sudden shriek that went through him,—­such as is heard

  “‘When the lone sea-bird wakes its wildest cry.’

“The fact was, a large gray gull, mistaking him for a corpse, had made a dash at him, and its loud discordant scream in a moment brought a countless number of these formidable birds together, all prepared to contest for a share of the spoil.  These large and powerful foes he had now to scare from their intended prey, and, by shouting and splashing with his hands and feet, in a few minutes they disappeared.

“He now caught sight of a vessel at anchor, but a great way off, and to get within hail of her he must swim over Carton Sands (the grave of thousands), the breakers at this time showing their angry white crests.  As he approached, the wind suddenly changed; the consequence of which was that the swell of the sea met him.  Here is his own description:—­’I got a great deal of water down my throat, which greatly weakened me, and I felt certain, that, should this continue, it would soon be all over, and I prayed that the wind might change, or that God would take away my senses before I felt what it was to drown.  In less time than I am telling you, I had driven over the sands into smooth water; the wind and swell came again from the eastward, and my strength returned to me as fresh as in the beginning.’