I presume the fearful
manner in which we struggled at the oars diminished the effect of our
voices, while the effort to raise a noise lessened our power with the
oars. We were already to leeward of the ship, though nearly in her
wake, and our only chance now was to over take her. The captain called
out to us to pull for life or death, and pull we did. So frantic were
our efforts, that I really think we should have succeeded, had not a
sea come on board us, and filled us to the thwarts. There remained no
alternative but to keep dead away, and to bail for our lives.
I confess I felt scalding tears gush down my cheeks, as I gazed at the
dark mass of the ship just before it was swallowed up in the gloom.
This soon occurred, and then, I make no doubt, every man in the boat
considered himself as hopelessly lost. We continued to bail,
notwithstanding; and, using hats, gourds, pots and pails, soon cleared
the boat, though it was done with no other seeming object than to
avert immediate death. I heard one of the Cape May men pray. The name
of his wife mingled with his petitions to God. As for poor Captain
Robbins, who had so recently been in another scene of equal danger in
a boat, he remained silent, seemingly submissive to the decrees of
Providence.
In this state we must have drifted a league dead before the wind, the
Cape May men keeping their eyes on the light, which was just sinking
below the horizon, while the rest of us were gazing seaward in ominous
expectation of what awaited us in that direction, when the hail of
"Boat ahoy!" sounded like the last trumpet in our ears.
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