that we had sailed with. There was the back stay to be set up afresh on
the weather quarter for the new tack also, and three men must see to that.

We watched my father's hand for the word, and steadily sheeted home
until all seemed to be going well. But the next moment there was a crash
and a cry, and we were a mastless wreck, drifting helplessly. Maybe some
flaw of wind took us as the head of the great sail went over, but its
power was too much for the men at guys and back stay, and they had the
tackle torn through their hands. The mast snapped six feet above the
deck, smashing the gunwales as it fell forward and overboard, but
hurting none of us.

Then a following sea or two broke over the stern, and I was washed from
the poop, for I had been at the sheet, down to the deck, and there saved
myself among the fallen rigging, half drowned. One of the men was washed
overboard at the same time, but a bight of the rigging that was over the
side caught him under the chin, and his mates hauled him on board again
by the head, as it were. He was wont to make a jest of it afterward,
saying that he was not likely to be hanged twice, but he had a wry neck
from that day forward.

No more seas came over us, for the wreck over the bows brought us head
to wind, though we shipped a lot of water across the decks as she rolled
in the sea. Then we rode to the drag of the fallen sail for a time, and
it seemed quiet now that there was no noise of wind screaming in rigging
above us. But all the while the thunder of the breakers grew nearer and
plainer.

I bided where I was, for the breath was knocked out of me for the
moment. I saw my father lash the helm, and then he and the rest got the