leeway towards the bank.

'I was half-blinded by scud, but suddenly I noticed what looked like
a gap, behind a spit which curled out right ahead. I luffed still
more to clear this spit, but she couldn't weather it. Before you
could say knife she was driving across it, bumped heavily, bucked
forward again, bumped again, and--ripped on in deeper water! I can't
describe the next few minutes. I was in some sort of channel, but a
very narrow one, and the sea broke everywhere. I hadn't proper
command either; for the rudder had crocked up somehow at the last
bump. I was like a drunken man running for his life down a dark
alley, barking himself at every corner. It couldn't last long, and
finally we went crash on to something and stopped there, grinding and
banging. So ended that little trip under a pilot.

'Well, it was like this--there was really no danger'--I opened my
eyes at the characteristic phrase. 'I mean, that lucky stumble into a
channel was my salvation. Since then I had struggled through a mile
of sands, all of which lay behind me like a breakwater against the
gale. They were covered, of course, and seething like soapsuds; but
the force of the sea was deadened. The Dulce was bumping, but not too
heavily. It was nearing high tide, and at half ebb she would be high
and dry.

'In the ordinary way I should have run out a kedge with the dinghy,
and at the next high water sailed farther in and anchored where I
could lie afloat. The trouble was now that my hand was hurt and my
dinghy stove in, not to mention the rudder business. It was the first
bump on the outer edge that did the damage. There was a heavy swell
there, and when we struck, the dinghy, which was towing astern, came