A schooner
was passing our track, keeping a little off, and got so near as to
allow us to be seen, though, owing to a remark about the light which
drew all eyes to windward, not a soul of us saw her. It was too late
to avert the blow, for the hail had hardly reached us, when the
schooner's cut-water came down upon our little craft, and buried it in
the sea as if it had been lead. At such moments men do not think, but
act. I caught at a bob-stay, and missed it. As I went down into the
water, my hand fell upon some object to which I clung, and, the
schooner rising at the next instant, I was grasped by the hair by one
of the vessel's men. I had hold of one of the Cape May men's legs.
Released from my weight, this man was soon in the vessel's head, and
he helped to save me. When we got in-board, and mustered our party it
was found that all had been saved but Captain Robbins. The schooner
wore round, and actually passed over the wreck of the boat a second
time; but our old commander was never heard of more!
CHAPTER VII.
"Oh! forget not the hour, when through forest and vale
We returned with our chief to his dear native halls!
Through the woody Sierra there sigh'd not a gale,
And the moonbeam was bright on his battlement walls;
And nature lay sleeping in calmness and light,
Round the house of the _truants_, that rose on our sight.
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