Come, try it. Well done."
"How the sea struggles with me! But I am strong, you see," cried Lucy,
her brow flushed with the battle.
"Very good; you are strong, and, what is better, resolute. Now,
observe me: this is port, this is starboard, and this is amidships."
"I see; but how am I to know which to do?"'
"I shall give you the word of command."
"And all I have to do is to obey it?"
"That is all; but you will find it enough, because the sea will seem
to fight you. It will shake the boat to make you leave go, and will
perhaps dash in your face to make you leave go."
"Forewarned, forearmed, Mr. Dodd. I will not let go. I will hold on by
my eyelids sooner than add to your danger."
"Jack, she is on fire; she gives me double heart."
"So she does me. She makes it a pleasure."
They were now near enough the point to judge what they had to do, and
the appearance of the sea was truly terrible; the waves were all
broken, and a surge of devouring fire seemed to rage and roar round
the point, and oppose an impassable barrier between them and the inky
pool beyond, where safety lay under the lee of the high rocks.
"I don't like it," said David. "It looks to me like going through a
strip of hell fire."
"But it is narrow," said Lucy.
"That is our chance; and the tide is coming in. We will try it. She
will drench us, but I don't much think she will swamp us. Are you
ready, all hands?"
"Oh! please wait a minute, till I do up my hair.
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