CHAPTER X.
Either tropic now
'Gan thunder, and both ends of heaven, the clouds,
From many a horrid rift abortive, poured
Fierce rain with lightning mixed, water and fire
In ruin reconciled.
Paradise Regained.
A brave vessel,
Who had, no doubt, some noble creatures in her,
Dash'd all to pieces.
Tempest.
The earth hath bubbles, as the water hath,
And these are of them.
Macbeth.
[figure description] Page 250.[end figure description]
The moon had scarcely been a moment above
the horizon, streaming her loveless light on the cold
and tremulous ocean, when a deep black cloud, that
had been slowly unrolling from the west, threw its
impenetrable drapery between her and the earth.
The wind had been gently breathing from the south-west,
its tranquil current disturbed only at intervals
by the fitful gusts that broke in upon its quietude,
-- 251 --
[figure description] Page 251.[end figure description]
like our passionate emotions which interrupt the repose
of the soul,—those spirit-birds of prey that hover
over our purer affections, and veil them awhile with
the shadow of their wings. It now suddenly veered
round to the north-west, and distant thunder rolling
heavily from the same direction, foretokened a conflict
of the elements. For a few minutes afterward
its very breathing seemed to cease, and a sense of
suffocation was felt, as if for a time the electric fluid
had drawn to its mighty reservoir the principle of
life. Though the moon was up, there was no light,
and the stillness of nature appeared like the silence
of a man before his last agony of dissolution.
Presently a light breeze came puffing from the
north-west, and a few large drops fell heavily to
earth,—when all at once a flash of chain lightning
burst forth from the exploding clouds, blinding and
bewildering with its intenseness, accompanied by a
simultaneous crash of thunder that made the heart
sick by its appalling power. The rain now poured
down like the water sheets of a cataract, and the blue
lightning, with incessant fires, flashed fearfully from
the clouds, the wind from the north-west blowing
with increasing violence. It seemed as if the fountains
of the great deep had again been broken up—
as if God's covenant with man had been cancelled
for his crimes.
Notwithstanding the comparatively secure harbor
that the Dolphin occupied, there was considerable
-- 252 --
[figure description] Page 252.[end figure description]
danger to be apprehended from the wind, which the
commander knew could not be relied on should the gale
continue. Accordingly all hands were piped on deck,
additional anchors were let go, and every needful
preparation was made to meet any contingency.
But the thunder-storm, after raging with great violence
for three hours, gradually died away, and the
wind hauling round to the north-east, the rain continued
to fall in cold, drizzling showers.
As the day broke, Fitzvassal was no longer doubtful
about the weather. Though the lower currents
of the atmosphere were setting from the north-east,
the clouds above were flying in other directions, and
thin vapory mists scudding beneath the heavier and
denser, showed that the rain would certainly continue,
and probably be accompanied by extraordinary gales.
He now regretted, that while the wind was blowing
from the north-west, he had not availed himself
of the advantage and run out to sea; for though he
believed that his anchors would hold the vessel in
any event that might occur, he felt that the open, unobstructed
ocean, with a wind off shore, was better
than an indifferent harbor in a gale. Possibly, however,
(was his consolatory reflection,) the Dolphin could
not have cleared Cape Cod in time, and he knew
Nantucket Shoals too well to prefer their danger to
one of infinitely less magnitude.
Unlike the thunder-storm that heralded it, the
north-easter came on gradually. It is generally so
-- 253 --
[figure description] Page 253.[end figure description]
with the most violent tempests. In consequence of
the change of the wind, the waves rolled in upon
the rocks with tremendous energy, which seemed
now, as the day advanced, to increase every instant;
but the wind did not blow with such strength that
any vessel might not safely attempt a harbor along
the coast; and in the early part of the day several
ships and brigs, with some smaller craft, were seen
beating into Salem and Boston harbors, the anchoring-grounds
of which they reached with little difficulty.
Towards evening, as the tide approached its full
flood, which was uncommonly high, the wind began
to rise, and soon raged like a tornado. The roar of
the waters could be heard even across the lower harbor
of Boston as it thundered on Nantasket Beach;
coming, too, against the wind from a distance of
many miles, and partly drowned by the din that
sounded from the iron-bound coast of Massachusetts.
The sublimity of the scene that now presented
itself cannot be imagined, though it was soon to be
surpassed; for it is not while the storm is raging
that the waves run the highest; but when the violence
of the tempest has abated, and the winds have
subsided to rest,—then it is that the vexed waters
swell and heave with the most fearful fury, and show
their perfect resemblance to the action of human
passion:—and how near to spiritual influences is the
analogy of the rains and the waves! For who,
-- 254 --
[figure description] Page 254.[end figure description]
when the ocean is troubled, and the billows toss him
with unrest, has not seen him tranquilized by the descending
drops from heaven? So when the agitated
bosom heaves with its lacerated affections, our
heaven-commissioned tears fall fast and soothingly
upon them, and leave us in the peace of the angels.
While the Dolphin was rocking on the waters,
Fitzvassal stood on the quarter-deck with Morgan,
gazing on the surrounding conflict with no little uneasiness.
The surf ran so high, that it would have
been madness to attempt forcing a boat in among the
rocks; and, notwithstanding their belief that Felton
had crossed the beach the night before, and was now
prevented from returning to Nahant, both the commander
and his pilot could not help expressing their
apprehension that all was not well with the first officer
of the Dolphin.
“Morgan,” said the commander, addressing the
pilot after they had been standing together some
time in silence, “I wish I could only get a glimpse
of Mr. Felton somewhere; for though we could not
take him off at such an ugly time as this, it would
be some satisfaction to know that he is in the land
of the living.”
“He's safe enough, I guess,” replied Morgan, who
seemed to be willing to afford all the encouragement
he could to hope for the best, for the reason that he
himself feared the worst; “he's safe enough, I guess,
-- 255 --
[figure description] Page 255.[end figure description]
Sir; he's only larking about Lynn, sailor fashion.
He'll be heaving in sight by and bye, depend on't.”
“But Mr. Felton has always been punctual to an
hour whenever he has been ashore, and I can hardly
believe that he would have run the risk of going
over to Lynn. But if he did go, why, it will be
difficult for him to get back again at present.”
“As for that matter,” said Morgan, “he can manage
to get back well enough arter he gets through
his lark, if he starts at low tide; howsomever, it
would be a tough job jest now. He's pluck enough
though, and knows what's what; but I wouldn't give
much for all the petticoat he got on Nahant this time.”
“Morgan!” exclaimed the commander, looking at
him steadfastly, “you remind me of a horrible dream
I had last night.”
“What was it?” inquired the pilot, with an expression
of suddenly-awakened interest.
“It's of no consequence,” replied the other, turning
away abruptly, as if inclined to obliterate the remembrance
of it; “thank heaven, I don't believe in
dreams.”
“But I do!” exclaimed Morgan, “for I've had'en
tell as true as a book. Did you ever hear of my
dream of the spectre-ship?—Hullo! what's all
this?” continued he, changing his tone to one of
more earnest inquiry, as he looked seaward.
The commander turned his eyes in the direction
indicated, and involuntarily started backward.
-- 256 --
[figure description] Page 256.[end figure description]
“Bring me the glass, Morgan, instantly!” he demanded.
Morgan did as he was ordered, when the commander,
having rapidly adjusted the instrument, narrowly
examined the object of their attention. It was
a brig scudding before the wind, and heading south-west
by west, as if she intended to make a harbor.
She was leaning down to the blast like a half-stripped
oak in a hurricane, and as she ploughed the huge
waves, the foam boiled up above her cutwater like
the surf of the cataract rapids.
“By heavens!” cried Fitzvassal, after carefully
observing her movements, and throwing out repeated
ejaculations of concern, “that brig, Morgan, is in a
dangerous way; only look at her!”
Morgan took the glass, and after a few moments'
examination, replied, with an emphasis of the utmost
excitement—
“You are right! you are right!—the wind has
hauled out to the east, and will have the south with
it presently,—she has got a lee-shore, that brig;—
God have mercy on her, whoever she is! See there,
Sir! she has made signal for a pilot—the devil himself
couldn't get aboard of her in such a storm as
this; do, for mercy's sake, look at her!”
The violence of the wind had now brought the
vessel near enough to be clearly seen from the deck
of the Dolphin, where all hands had collected on the
forecastle to watch her dangerous progress.
-- 257 --
[figure description] Page 257.[end figure description]
“Whoever commands that vessel,” said Fitzvassal
in a low and deliberate tone, expressive of the deep
interest he felt in the fate of the stranger, “understands
his business. He was right in bringing his
royal-masts and top-gallant yards on deck.”
“I never saw any thing to beat that,” exclaimed
Morgan, whose eyes almost started from his head
with astonishment, as, leaning over the tafferel of the
vessel, his feet shuffled on the quarter-deck from
his mere inability to be quiet: “that fellow understands
a thing or two!”
“She is going right before the wind, Morgan!”
“Ay, ay, Sir; and if the wind would haul another
point to the east, and take a little of the north with
it, that poor devil might yet get into Boston harbor;
but the way she has it now, there is a small chance
for her.”
“That's right! my good fellow, that's right!” exclaimed
Fitzvassal, who was so highly excited by the
movements of the brig as not to heed what the pilot
was saying; “that's right, close reef your main top-sail!”
As he spoke, the close reefing of the sail was executed
with a promptness and precision which drew
a loud murmur of approbation from the crowded
forecastle of the Dolphin.
The brig was evidently relieved by this movement,
and was still more so when, a moment after, the intrepid
sailors sprang to the treadropes of the foresail,
-- 258 --
[figure description] Page 258.[end figure description]
and reefed that also in obedience to the speaking-trumpet
below them.
“Gallantly done, my boys! gallantly done, that!”
shouted the commander of the Dolphin, as if the
mariners of the stranger brig were in hearing of his
voice, or were under his own command: “now set
the foretopmast stay-sail!” cried he, elevating his
voice—“away there, for your lives!”
As if in obedience to that voice, the foretopmast
staysail of the brig was immediately set, and the vessel,
for a few seconds after, seemed to be feeling the
wind north-east by north.
At this juncture, while the brig was about
three miles distant from Nahant, bearing hardly two
points clear of the Sunken Ledge, the tide being
nearly high, and the wind and current setting in the
same direction, so that the danger was not so apparent
to them on board, the wind suddenly shifted
several points to the southward, and at once revealed
to them the appalling danger of their vessel.
“God have mercy on her now!” groaned Fitzvassal,
“there is nothing but a miracle can save her!”
The manœuvres of the brig were now most painfully
interesting to every one that observed them,
“and the boldest held his breath for a time.” The
unhappy vessel immediately hauled on a wind in
the desperate attempt to work herself out of danger.
Fitzvassal seized the hand of Morgan, lost to every
other consideration in his overwhelming anxiety for
-- 259 --
[figure description] Page 259.[end figure description]
the stranger that was now exposed to the worst possible
lee-shore, and seemed doomed to inevitable destruction.
“That's right! bravely done!” exclaimed Fitzvassal,
“set your trysail! Right, again! Now your
double-reefed foretopsail! Well done, my fine fellows!
Thunder and Mars! was there ever such a
gale as this!”
“Hurrah!” vociferated the pilot, “she feels it now—
that seamanship was to some purpose.”
The brig was now evidently wearing away from
her dangerous bearings; but though she had a possible
chance of clearing the Sunken Ledge, she made
too much lee-way to afford any security to her hopes.
She had already approached near enough to Nahant
to discover, by the boiling of the water, that a terrific
reef of rocks lay right in the course she had just
avoided. The commander of that devoted vessel
was unquestionably master of his art, and in the
midst of the horrors that surrounded him, had displayed
all the skill it was possible to exercise in his
dreadful situation.
Since the trysail had been set, and the double-reefed
foretopsail, the brig ploughed deeper furrows,
and tossed the foam about her like a wild horse
chased by a lion. The wind raged with such power
that the waves were torn up from their ocean-bed,
and scattered like the driving rain in the blast. Never
had the spectators of the scene witnessed so
-- 260 --
[figure description] Page 260.[end figure description]
tremendous a tempest. Fortunately for the Dolphin,
her anchors and cables proved sufficient for the trial,
though she rocked and pitched about most dangerously
for her safety.
“She makes too much lee-way, Morgan!” said
the commander of the schooner, “she can't clear
these rocks, I'm afraid.”
“What ought she to de?” inquired the pilot;
“what would you do, Captain, in such a case as this;
for, by the ghost of my great grandmother, I can't
see any get off in such a fix as that!”
“It would depend somewhat on the quality of my
spars,” replied the commander. “It is one of those
tough cases that a sailor doesn't like to think of,
much less to experience. Would to God the wind
would shift an atom to the north.”
“Amen!” ejaculated Morgan.
The devoted brig, in the meanwhile, gained rapidly
on the reef, and the hearts of the mariners, steeled
as they were to extraordinary danger, quailed
with instinctive horror. They were but a mile from
Nahantrocks, where the surf ran mountain high; and
it was but too apparent that if they could clear the
Sunken Ledge, their chance was still but one in a
thousand of escaping a watery grave; for the brig
must have run down the Dolphin if it escaped the
Ledge. Their chance was in the desperate movement
that followed.
“Look! Morgan, only look!” cried Fitzvassal,
-- 261 --
[figure description] Page 261.[end figure description]
stretching both arms in the direction of the brig, and
turning his face round to the pilot; “she is going to
make the last, great move;—every thing now depends
on the toughness of her pine and canvass!”
“Good luck to that Captain, for a fine fellow;”
said Morgan, in a tone that indicated his entire interest
in the stranger.
As they spoke, the close reef was let out from
her main-topsail, which was hoisted up.
“Now for it! Now for it!” breathed Fitzvassal,
in hardly enunciated tones.
Immediately the brig bowed before the force of
the superadded canvass, burying herself in the foam.
“God of mercy! it is going!—it is going!” exclaimed
Fitzvassal; it is all over with her now!—
God have mercy on her crew!”
While he was speaking, the main-topmast bent
like a strained bow—then cracked, and went by the
board,—while the main-topsail and the trysail were
torn literally to ribbons, leaving the ill-fated vessel
perfectly unmanageable, and wholly at the mercy of
the storm. To keep her by the wind was now impossible;
her head payed off, and she ran before the
tempest in despair.
Amidst the roaring of the waters, the shrill whistling
of the winds, and the beating of the surge,
came the agonizing shrieks of the passengers and
crew of the doomed vessel, as now, unmindful of
-- 262 --
[figure description] Page 262.[end figure description]
the helm, she rolled and pitched about at times with
her broadside to the gale.
In this moment of abandonment, a gleam of hope
still remained to those on board of her, that the brig
might possibly drive harmless over the Sunken Ledge.
That hope, in its fruition, would have been fatal to
the Dolphin, and perhaps as destructive to herself;
for a cussion of the two would have been almost
unavoidable, and either they would have chafed
themselves to pieces, or the Dolphin would have been
run down and foundered. It was a moment of intense
agony to them. The hope of the one was the
despair of the other. The sacrifice of all on board
one or both of them seemed inevitable!
Alas! the hope that gleamed for a moment on the
hearts of the devoted crew was soon to be quenched
for ever. The brig once more turned her bow towards
the Sunken Ledge, and gaining fresh headway
in the hurricane, amidst the heart-rending cries of the
voyagers, drove fast upon the treacherous reef. For
a moment the whole fabric shook like an earthquake,
and as the sea roared over her decks, her remaining
masts and spars were rent away, carrying with them
stays, rattlings and all, in one fell swoop of destruction.
The night was now fast closing in—coming “at a
stride,” to throw its mantle over a scene of horror
that defies description. The last trace of despair exhibited
to the appalled gaze of the spectators, was
-- 263 --
[figure description] Page 263.[end figure description]
the vision of a dozen men and as many women lashed
to the weather gunwale of the brig, that lay careened
on the rocks with her lee buried in the ocean.
Her whole deck was exposed to view; but in a few
minutes no knowledge would have been had of their
perilous endurance, except from the frantic screams
of the people on board.
The feelings of Fitzvassal and his crew may haply
be imagined by those who have been similarly placed,
where the agonizing cries of the dying have appealed
to them in heart-rending entreaties under circumstances
where relief was impossible.
We will now transfer the reader to the peninsula
of Nahant, where scenes were in the interim enacted
that may at the present day seem incredible, but
which, about the time we refer to, were known and
authentically reported in every part of the known
world.
We live in the iron age of science, when men run
to and fro, and knowledge abounds. We have seen,
so to speak, the consummation of the sensual church,
when the spirit of selfishness has completed its insane
philosophy in the reception of exclusive egotism
or in dreams of pantheistic romance; we have
stripped spiritual truth of all the habiliments by
which she can be known to man; we have torn away
the beautiful vesture of holiness, and suffered her to
grow cold and die in the chill atmosphere of the
world; we have reduced all experience to faith, and
-- 264 --
[figure description] Page 264.[end figure description]
our principles to generalized facts; we cannot see
a truth that is not tangible by induction, we cannot
recognize a good which does not contribute to wealth.
What is art, what is literature, what is religion in
this utilitarian age? There is no art but mechanic
art that meets with encouragement, there is no literature
called for but what the prurient irritation of a
morbid body desires, there is no religion but the worship
of the idol Self.
Men would at this day deny the principles of the
Scriptures as boldly and as openly as they reject the
testimony of Cotton Mather, Chief Justice Holt, and
half the contemporary judges of Christendom, in
relation to witchcraft, if they dared to do so. And is
it strange, that they who are ashamed to be called or
even to be thought Christians, should strive hard to put
down all belief in those horrible forms of spirituality,
which, if we admit them to be true, go so far to
demonstrate the existence of their beautiful opposites,
the reality of angelic beings—the certainty of a
state of living which to the worldly and self-sufficient
would be any thing but congenial?
Our fathers have been studying psychology ever
since the Mosaic world began, and we, their descendants,
know absolutely nothing about it yet. A vast
many tomes of curious speculation have found the
present generation as ignorant as were their renowned
authors. There was a time when a true psychology
existed,—or rather, when a perception of the
-- 265 --
[figure description] Page 265.[end figure description]
soul's nature was permitted to man; and hence we
see a ray of truth struggling here and there in the
writings of Plato and his followers, though nothing
more than a ray is discoverable. A gem of inestimable
value has been lost by man, and because his
children have been vainly groping for ages in the
wrong path to find it, they have at last concluded
not only that there never was such a lose, but that
the reported existence of the gem itself is only an
historical blunder. Lord Shaftsbury's test of truth
is nothing more than a criterion of human firmness,
precisely as is any other form of persecution. The
ridicule of the encyclopedists did prostrate truth in
France, and the persecution of the English ecclesiastics
did shake the fortitude of Cranmer. The truth
was not essentially affected because religion became
unfashionable in Paris, and the faith of the English
dissenter was not touched by his temporary recantation.
It is time to overhaul and cast away many of
our old saws and most of our modern instances.
Since the sacrifice of Felton, an apparent change
had taken place in the feelings of Nameoke. She
had been disappointed in her efforts to avert evil, and
she bitterly lamented the fate of the unhappy wretch,
whose uncontrolable impulses had hurried him to
his death. Often would she suddenly start from her
fixed posture of thoughtfulness, and, as if to fly from
some predominant reflection, hurry away among the
rough passes of the rocks, and chant her wild songs
-- 266 --
[figure description] Page 266.[end figure description]
to the waves. Then as suddenly would she return
to her cave, and, rekindling the fire, go through her
mystic enchantments.
It was but a moment before the unhappy vessel
struck, that Nameoke, in one of those sudden fits of
transition, hastened toward Pulpit Rock, her favorite
observatory when the sky was clear at night, or when
the moon shone bright upon the waters.
It was already growing dark, but objects were as
yet sufficiently discernible. As she approached the
cliff, she shrunk back with horror at the spectacle
she beheld. The brig had already struck upon the
reef, and her masts were going by the board at the
very moment Nameoke arrived at the bank she would
have to descend before she could reach the rock.
The interval between is scooped out in a craggy
glen, over which the surf was then beating furiously,
so that it would have been impassable to the boldest
adventurer.
In the midst of this “hell of waters,” on a large
isolated fragment of rock, from which the Sunken
Ledge could casily be discerned through a rift in the
craggy mass, Nameoke saw two hideous women,
whose outward forms were expressive of the evil
which they loved. One of them looked like a disinterred
body that had died of the plague, her livid
face blotched with the death-spots of the pestilence,
her pale blue eyes turning askant with the glazed
and suspicious expression of insanity. Her features
-- 267 --
[figure description] Page 267.[end figure description]
were sharp, her chin prominent, and her under-jaw
moved to and fro while she mumbled diabolical sentences.
The other was a short black woman, her
face deeply pock-marked, and her features of the very
worst stamp of African ugliness. She, too, looked as
if she had been dug up from the grave, a specimen
from the catacombs of Egypt.
Between these detestable shapes Nameoke discovered
the body of a dead man stretched out upon the
rock; they were squatting one on each side of it,
and they were clapping their hands, and swaying
their bodies in the agitation of frantic mirth, while
their skinny fingers stopped only to point at the devastation
that was going on in the storm.
“Ho! ho!” screamed the black hag, “the charm
works rarely, Sister!”
“Sith,” said the other, “we never saw such sport
at the Brocken.”
And the crags echoed the ha! ha! of their spectre-laugh,
till Nameoke's blood ran cold, familiar as
she had been with scenes of similar horror.
“Brave fun for the hells! brave fun for the hells!”
chuckled the livid witch, her long gray locksstreaming
to the gale, and her skeleton-looking arms creaking at
every joint as she tossed them about deliriously. “Ha!
ha! ha! The thunder-spirits have felt the charm, and
the dragon-tongued lightnings are coming to the festival.
We shall have brave corpses to-night!”
As she spoke, there was a noise like the roar of
-- 268 --
[figure description] Page 268.[end figure description]
subterranean artillery, and flashes of infernal fire
broke out from the scathed rocks, and streamed from
the sea brighter than the corruscations of the Greenland
Aurora. By this terrific glare the awful condition
of the lost brig was plainly visible, for the
light seemed to be concentrated on that alone, leaving
the whole surrounding back-ground darker than
the depths of midnight. Every form on board the
brig was clearly defined. All order and discipline
among the crew was gone, and several of the sailors
were seen quaffing large draughts in their despair,
which, by the expression of their faces, had evidently
brought on madness. Some were in the attitude
of prayer, and others were seen stretching their
clenched hands to the clouds, and howling their imprecations
on providence. Among the passengers, there
were two that appeared to be lovers, for they hung
upon each other's necks with passionate tenderness,
and seemed to be lost to every thing but those last
precious moments of endearment.
“Ho! ho!” ejaculated the black hag—“the henbane
works, does it? Scorch brains! come madness!
drown all! Your resurrection-germs shall wander
on the cold ocean—they shall not have a church-yard
to grow merry in. Fall to pieces! split asunder!
stifle in the brine! stifle in the brine! I did it
all! 'twas my work—I boiled the henbane for them!”
“Ha! ha! ha!” hysterically laughed the pale
monster, “and if you did, I'll finish the deed with a
-- 269 --
[figure description] Page 269.[end figure description]
vengeance; and then we'll away to the Brocken.
Sha'n't we have a rare tale for the Hartz to-night?
Sha'n't we kiss the goat merrily, Sister?”
As she spoke, big drops of laughter-brine rolled
from her evil eyes, and her frame shook with maniac
mirthfulness.
“Now for it, Sister!”
With these words she tore a handful of hair from
the scalp of the dead man beneath her, and tossing
it to the winds, exclaimed,—
“Finish! finish! finish! Prince of the Air, thy
promise!”
At this moment the wind seemed to double its violence,
and a wave, enormously large, came towering
on from the sea. In an instant the brig was overwhelmed,
and as the wave rolled back, not a vestige
remained of the ruin.
“Monsters!” screamed Nameoke, whose horror
had till now made her speechless, “Monsters and
not women! are ye at last satisfied with the blood of
the innocent?”
They turned upon her their hideous visages while
she spoke, as if they had all along known that she
was their witness, and pointing to the corpse between
them, laughed loud and scornfully at Nameoke.
The thunder-peals now followed the fierce lightning
with astounding power, and the hurricane was
at the height of its violence. As Nameoke stood in
its fury, petrified by the hellish spectacle before her,
-- 270 --
[figure description] Page 270.[end figure description]
a wave larger then the rest bounded over the intervening
surge, bearing on its crested head the lovers
who had been seen on board the devoted brig, still
alive, and holding each other with the energy of despair.
They were both in the bloom and beauty of
youth; their hopes, their wishes, their happiness,
alas! lost, lost to earth for ever! The receding wave
had left them in the space between the hag-demons
and Nameoke, and their inflamed eyes fell suddenly
upon them.
“Save them! for the love of the great God, save
them, save them!” cried Nameoke; and she sprang
with superhuman alacrity to minister to their sufferings,
and, if possible, to shield them from the grave.
The attempt was in vain. The power of evil was
for a time apparently triumphant. With a scream
of frenzy the two hags seized the lovers, and with inconceivable
strength threw them headlong into the sea.
Nameoke swooned away at the sight. When she revived,
she found herself alone among the rocks. The
day had dawned; the storm had died away to a clam;
but not the slightest trace was ever found of the
shipwrecked vessel, but her anchor on the Sunken
Ledge.
END OF VOL. I.
