whose heat we could yet feel on our scorched
faces. From every part now the flames were
rushing, even from the cabin windows beneath
where I had so lately been standing, and I could
hardly keep from shuddering as I thought of the
awful danger.

It was hard work forcing the raft through
the water on account of the breeze which set
towards the ship; but we got further and
further away, and were some distance off when
the mizen-mast went blazing over the side; but
still the captain said we were not safe, and
swam on till we could not feel the breeze; and
at length panting and exhausted he hung on
motionless, and said we must risk it now.

Then we were both silent, and watched the
boats now further away from us, and the blazing
ship seeming to be the centre of a glorious
ring of light, on the outside of which like sparks
we all lay waiting for the end we knew was soon
to come. Everywhere else was dark as pitch,
not even a star to be seen, while the waves just
rose and curled a little over as they washed
against our raft: excepting the dull roar and
crackle of the flames, everything was as still as
death.

All at once I started, for the captain spoke
sadly as he looked at his vessel; and out of the
silence his voice sounded wild and strange:

"If I'd had a crew like you, my man, I think
we could have saved her;" and then he spoke
no more, for just then, from being quite still, the
good ship seemed to roll a little towards us, and
then to the other side, slowly, and as if just
bending to the breeze; and then we could almost
see the water creeping up her burning sides as
clouds of steam arose; and with one calm
steady dip forward she seemed to plunge right
down beneath the golden waters. Then there
was a rising and falling of the sea, and a deep,
dense darkness, out of which close by me came
one of the bitterest, heart-tearing sobs I ever
heard from the breast of man; and I did not
speak, for I felt that it was the captain sorrowing
for the loss of his good ship.

For a good piece the silence was as deep as
the darkness, and then the captain was the first
to break it in quite a cheerful voice:

"Can you lay your hand on the rope?" he
says; and I passed it to him, and then I could
hear him in the dark busily at work tying and
fastening; and at last he says: "Now crawl on
again; it will bear you better;" and faint and
wearily I managed to crawl on, and lay with my
legs in the water and my head on the bag of
biscuit; and directly after I felt him crawl on
too, and we took hold of hands and lay there in
the deep darkness while he said that prayer out
aloud in such a soft, deep voice—that prayer
as we first learnt kneeling down years ago by
our mother's knee. When he came to
"Deliver us from evil," he stopped short; and soon,
worn out there in the great ocean, floating on a
few pieces of wood, we both felt in Whose hands
we were, and slept till the warm bright sun
shone upon us and told us that another day
was here.

The first thing the captain did was to stand
up and look round, and then he said he could
see only one boat; but he hoisted up one of
the pieces of wood, and wedged it in the coop
with a handkerchief flying at the top, after
which we made a hearty meal of the biscuit,
raw bacon, and water. After this the captain
got one of the coops on the other, and by binding
and lashing, he made a much higher and
better raft, so that we could keep our biscuit
and bacon out of the water and sit dry
ourselves.

And so we lay all that day till towards evening,
when we found that the boat was coming
towards us, and just at dusk it was within hail;
and if ever I'd felt hopeful or joyful before in
my life, it was then. They had no room for us,
but they took us in tow, and the weather keeping
calm, we all rowed and worked in turns,
steering according to the captain's direction for
the nearest land; for when our turn came we
two went into the boat, and two others came
out on to the raft, and so we toiled on for days,
when one morning there was a joyful cry:

"A sail! a sail!"

And it was, too, within a mile of us, plainer
and plainer as that glorious sun rose; and then
some laughed, some cried, and one or two
seemed half mad with joy, as after a while
she ran down towards us, picked us up, and
proved to be a British man-of-war, homeward
bound.

In another week I was back in the port
I left, without clothes, without money, but
with as good and true a friend in Captain Ellis
as ever walked. I had life, and with it came
hope; and somehow, since then, things have
prospered with me in the old country—the old
home that I once left to go far at sea.

With the Sixteenth Volume will be commenced, in No. 377,
for July 14,
THE TALE OF
AUNT MARGARET'S TROUBLE.
BY A NEW WRITER.

THE FIFTEENTH VOLUME
will be published on Monday the 16th of July, price 5s. 6d.,
bound in cloth.
** The back numbers of All the Year Round, in single
copies, monthly parts, and half-yearly volumes, can
always be had of every bookseller, and at every
bookstall.

Shortly will be published, in Three Volumes,
THE SECOND MRS. TILLOTSON
BY THE AUTHOR OF "NEVER FORGOTTEN."
Tinsley Brothers, 18, Catherine-street, London.