in thousands, of gallons which I am guaranteed to throw per hour;
but I assure you, my complaining friends, that there is not the
least danger. I alone am capable of clearing any water that may
find its way here. By my Biggest Deliveries, we pitched then!"

The sea was getting up in workmanlike style. It was a dead westerly
gale, blown from under a ragged opening of green sky, narrowed on
all sides by fat, grey clouds; and the wind bit like pincers as it
fretted the spray into lacework on the flanks of the waves.

"I tell you what it is," the foremast telephoned down its
wire-stays. "I'm up here, and I can take a dispassionate view
of things. There's an organised conspiracy against us. I'm
sure of it, because every single one of these waves is heading
directly for our bows. The whole sea is concerned in it - and
so's the wind. It's awful!"

"What's awful?" said a wave, drowning the capstan for the
hundredth time.

"This organised conspiracy on your part," the capstan gurgled,
taking his cue from the mast. "Organised bubbles and spindrift!
There has been a depression in the Gulf of Mexico. Excuse me!"
He leaped overside; but his friends took up the tale one after
another.

"Which has advanced - "That wave hove green water over the funnel.

"As far as Cape Hatteras - " He drenched the bridge.