continually met, and made the most awful and roarin' pilin' up of
waves that ever was known.

"My little boat was pitched about as if it had been a feather
in a breeze, and when the front part of it was cleavin' itself
down into the water the hind part was stickin' up until the
rudder whizzed around like a patent churn with no milk in it.
The thunder began to roar and the lightnin' flashed, and three
seagulls, so nearly frightened to death that they began to turn
up the whites of their eyes, flew down and sat on one of the
seats of the boat, forgettin' in that awful moment that man was
their nat'ral enemy. I had a couple of biscuits in my pocket,
because I had thought I might want a bite in crossing, and I
crumbled up one of these and fed the poor creatures. Then I
began to wonder what I was goin' to do, for things were gettin'
awfuller and awfuller every instant, and the little boat was a-
heavin' and a-pitchin' and a-rollin' and h'istin' itself up,
first on one end and then on the other, to such an extent that if
I hadn't kept tight hold of the rudder-handle I'd slipped off the
seat I was sittin' on.

"All of a sudden I remembered that oil in the can; but just
as I was puttin' my fingers on the cork my conscience smote me.
`Am I goin' to use this oil,' I said to myself, `and let my
sister-in-law's husband be wrecked for want of it?' And then I
thought that he wouldn't want it all that night, and perhaps they
would buy oil the next day, and so I poured out about a
tumblerful of it on the water, and I can just tell you sailormen
that you never saw anything act as prompt as that did. In three
seconds, or perhaps five, the water all around me, for the