she looked boldly into the very eye of the wind; and then, yielding
gracefully to its power, she fell off on the other tack, with her head
pointed from those dangerous shoals that she had so recently approached
with such terrifying velocity. The heavy yards swung round, as if they
had been vanes to indicate the currents of the air; and in a few moments
the frigate again moved, with stately progress, through the water,
leaving the rocks and shoals behind her on one side of the bay, but
advancing towards those that offered equal danger on the other.

During this time the sea was becoming more agitated, and the violence of
the wind was gradually increasing. The latter no longer whistled amid
the cordage of the vessel, but it seemed to howl, surlily, as it passed
the complicated machinery that the frigate obtruded on its path. An
endless succession of white surges rose above the heavy billows, and the
very air was glittering with the light that was disengaged from the
ocean. The ship yielded, each moment, more and more before the storm,
and in less than half an hour from the time that she had lifted her
anchor, she was driven along with tremendous fury by the full power of a
gale of wind. Still the hardy and experienced mariners who directed her
movements held her to the course that was necessary to their
preservation, and still Griffith gave forth, when directed by their
unknown pilot, those orders that turned her in the narrow channel where
alone safety was to be found.

So far, the performance of his duty appeared easy to the stranger, and
he gave the required directions in those still, calm tones, that formed
so remarkable a contrast to the responsibility of his situation. But
when the land was becoming dim, in distance as well as darkness, and the
agitated sea alone was to be discovered as it swept by them in foam, he
broke in upon the monotonous roaring of the tempest with the sounds of