her nose to the sea.  All night long the captain hung on the bridge.  It was his second night, and in that time he had only had one biscuit, that the mate gave him.  His legs were very tired, and every muscle was strained in the effort to cling fast.  He could, of course, see nothing; and it was only by the compass that he could tell how to keep her head.  At midnight a wave swept everything; the compass amidships and the one astern both went, and a man was taken overboard.  Still the wind kept on, and the only light to be seen was the flash of the curling spray.  The dawn broke, and still the sea was bad.  At seven o’clock a tremendous crash sounded, and the vessel staggered:  there was a long ripping grind, and the port bulwark was gone; so all the seas that came aboard after this had their own way, and as the vessel “listed” to port the deck was a very dangerous place.  The mate managed again to get near the captain.  He said:  “The men want you to put her before the sea, sir; so do I.”  The captain replied:  “If you propose such a thing again, sir, I’ll break your head as soon as I can get loose from here.  Keep the men in heart.”  At noon the second mate came forward with a white face, saying:  “The tarpaulin’s gone off the after-hold, sir.”  The captain was badly put out by hearing this, but he shouted:  “Lash the men how you can, and try to make fast again.”  While the men (with ropes round their waists) were wrestling with the tarpaulin, a wave doubled over the ship, making her shake; and, as the captain afterwards said, “the fellows were swimming like black-beetles in a basin of water.”  One poor “ordinary” went overboard in the wash of this sea, and nothing could be done for him.  At four o’clock the chief engineer came up, and managed to tell the captain that two fires were drowned out, and that the firemen would stay below no longer.  The captain asked, “Have you the middle fire?” and receiving an affirmative answer, he said, “Give the men each half a tumbler of brandy to put some pluck in them.”  A merry Irish fireman was so influenced by his dose of spirit that he joked and coaxed his mates down below again, and once more the fight was resumed.  The sun drooped low, and threw long swords of light through rifts in the dull grey veil.  The captain knew it was now or never, so he managed to get the men called where they could hear him, and shouted:  “Now, when that sun dips we’ll have the warmest half-hour of all.  If she lives through that and the gale breaks, I can save her.  If she doesn’t, you must die like men.  You should say your prayers.”  When the “warm half-hour” came it was something beyond belief.  The “Coquet” was as bare as a newly launched hull before it was over; then came a kind of long sigh, and the wind relaxed its force.  All night the sea lessened; and at dawn there was but a light air of wind, with no breaking waves at all.  The captain then dared to run before the sea; he got his vessel round, and she went comfortably away on the steady roll.  He had known all along that if he tried to fetch her round she would assuredly share the fate of the “London.”  That steamer was smashed in by a doubling sea that came over her stern while the captain was trying to take her about.