And now Elias saw what sort of a boat he really had. She skipped over
the waves like a sea-mew; not so much as a splash came into the boat,
and he therefore calculated that he would have no need to take in all
his clews[7] against the wind, which an ordinary _Femböring_ would have
been forced to do in such weather.

Out on the sea, not very far away from him, he saw another _Femböring_,
with a full crew, and four clews in the sail, just like his own. It lay
on the same course, and he thought it rather odd that he had not noticed
it before. It made as if it would race him, and when Elias perceived
that, he could not for the life of him help letting out a clew again.

And now he went racing along like a dart, past capes and islands and
rocks, till it seemed to Elias as if he had never had such a splendid
sail before. Now, too, the boat showed itself what it really was, the
best boat in Ranen.

The weather, meantime, had become worse, and they had already got a
couple of dangerous seas right upon them. They broke in over the
main-sheet in the forepart of the boat where Bernt sat, and sailed out
again to leeward near the stern.

Since the gloom had deepened, the other boat had kept almost alongside,
and they were now so close together that they could easily have pitched
the baling-can from one to the other.

So they raced on, side by side, in constantly stiffer seas, till
night-fall, and beyond it. The fourth clew ought now to have been taken
in again, but Elias didn't want to give in, and thought he might bide a