Marble screwed
his lips together, and his eyes never turned from the weather-leeches
of the sails. Everybody appeared to me to be holding his breath, as
the ship rose on the long ground-swells, sending slowly ahead the
whole time. We passed the nearest point of the rocks on one of the
rounded risings of the water, just touching lightly as we glided by
the visible danger. The blow was light, and gave little cause for
alarm. Captain Robbins now caught Mr. Marble by the hand, and was in
the very act of heartily shaking it, when the ship came down very much
in the manner that a man unexpectedly lights on a stone, when he has
no idea of having anything within two or three yards of his feet. The
blow was tremendous, throwing half the crew down; at the same instant,
all three of the topmasts went to leeward.
One has some difficulty in giving a reader accurate notions of the
confusion of so awful a scene. The motion of the vessel was arrested
suddenly, as it might be by a wall, and the whole fabric seemed to be
shaken to dissolution. The very next roller that came in, which would
have undulated in towards the land but for us, meeting with so large a
body in its way, piled up and broke upon our decks, covering
everything with water. At the same time, the hull lifted, and, aided
by wind, sea and current, it set still further on the reef, thumping
in a way to break strong iron bolts, like so many sticks of
sealing-wax, and cracking the solid live-oak of the floor-timbers as
if they were made of willow.
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