“Call you this hope?” exclaimed Mrs Wyllys, when his short explanation was ended, her cheek again blanching with disappointment.  “I have heard that the gulf, which foundering vessels leave, swallows all lesser objects that are floating nigh!”

“It sometimes happens.  For worlds I would not deceive you; and I now say that I think our chance for escape equal to that of being ingulfed with the vessel.”

“This is terrible!” murmured the governess, “but the will of Heaven be done!  Cannot ingenuity supply the place of strength, and the boat be cast from the decks before the fatal moment arrives?”

Wilder shook his head in an unequivocal negative.

“We are not so weak as you may think us,” said Gertrude.  “Give a direction to our efforts, and let us see what may yet be done.  Here is Cassandra,” she added—­turning to the black girl already introduced to the reader, who stood behind her young and ardent mistress, with the mantle and shawls of the latter thrown over her arm, as if about to attend her on an excursion for the morning—­“here is Cassandra who alone has nearly the strength of a man.”

“Had she the strength of twenty, I should despair of launching the boat without the aid of machinery But we lose time in words; I will go below, in order to judge of the probable duration of our doubt and then to our preparations.  Even you, fair and fragile as you seem, lovely being, may aid in the latter.”

He then pointed out such lighter objects as would be necessary to their comfort, should they be so fortunate as to get clear of the wreck, and advised their being put into the boat without delay.  While the three females were thus usefully employed, he descended into the hold of the ship, in order to note the increase of the water, and make his calculations on the time that would elapse before the sinking fabric must entirely disappear.  The fact proved their case to be more alarming than even Wilder had been led to expect.  Stripped of her masts, the vessel had laboured so heavily as to open many of her seams; and, as the upper works began to settle beneath the level of the ocean, the influx of the element was increasing with frightful rapidity.  As the young manner gazed about him with an understanding eye, he cursed, in the bitterness of his heart, the ignorance and superstition that had caused the desertion of the remainder of the crew.  There existed, in reality, no evil that exertion and skill could not have remedied; but, deprived of all aid, he at once saw the folly of even attempting to procrastinate a catastrophe that was now unavoidable.  Returning with a heavy heart to the deck, he immediately set about those dispositions which were necessary to afford them the smallest chance of escape.