end of what was thought to be the dangerous point.  The frigate was fully two miles astern; and, instead of losing anything of her vantage-ground, she was kept so near the wind as to be occasionally touching.  This was the more safe, inasmuch as the sea was perfectly smooth, and the vessel made no lee-way.  Still the frigate looked, as it is termed, barely up to the point it was deemed indispensable to weather; and as ships rarely “do” better than they “look,” it became a question of serious doubt on board the Proserpine, as she came up with the headland, whether she could clear it.

“I am afraid, Captain Cuffe, we shall never clear it with a good-enough berth, sir,” observed the fidgeting Griffin; “it seems to me the ship sets unaccountably to leeward to-day!”

“She never behaved better, Griffin.  I am really in hopes there is a slight current off-shore here; if anything, we actually open the highlands of Corsica by this promontory.  You see that the wreck of la Divina Providenza is sweeping round the bay and is coming out to windward again.”

“That may serve us, indeed!  All ready in the chains, sir!—­shall we make a cast of the lead?”

Cuffe assented, and the lead was hove.  At this moment the ship was going eight knots, and the man reported no bottom, with fifteen fathoms of line out.  This was well, and two or three subsequent casts confirmed it.  Orders were now given to drag every bowline, swig-off on every brace, and flatten-in all the sheets.  Even the halyards were touched in order that the sails might stand like boards.  The trying moment was near; five minutes must decide the matter.

“Let her shake a little, Mr. Yelverton, and eat into the wind,” said Cuffe, addressing the officer of the watch; “we must do all we can here; for when abreast of the breakers everything must be a rap-full to keep the ship under quick command.  There—­meet her with the helm, and give her a good full.”

This experiment was repeated twice, and each time the frigate gained her length to windward, though she necessarily lost more than three times that distance in her velocity.  At length the trial came, and a profound silence, one in which nervousness and anxiety were blended with hope, reigned in the vessel.  The eyes of all turned from the sails to the breakers; from the breakers to the sails; and from both to the wake of the ship.

At such moments the voice of the lead’s-man prevails over all other sounds.  His warning cry is listened to with breathless attention when the songs of a siren would be unheard.  Cast after cast was made as the ship drove on, and the answer to Cuffe’s questions was uniformly, “No bottom, sir, with fifteen fathoms out”; but just at this instant arose the regular song from the weather main-chains of “by the mark seven!” This came so suddenly on the captain’s ear that he sprang upon the taffrail, where he could command a full view of all he wanted to see, and then he called out in a stentorian voice: