Fauconnaire, her foremast snapped short off by the deck.  In a moment she broached too, driving gradually broadside on to Jethou.  The other finding she could not run into port, ran off towards Jersey where she might get better shelter, if it were not altogether a case of leaping out of the frying-pan into the fire, as the Jersey rocks are quite as hard and sharp as ours.  At any rate in half an hour she was lost to sight.

The one which was now so helplessly driving towards where I stood was a trim little trading ketch of some fifty tons burthen, and from my elevated position I could see everything that took place on her deck.  I saw the men (there were three men and a boy) cast out two anchors which appeared to hold her, then they commenced to cut away the mast and gear, which had fallen overboard and was thumping her sides so continuously as to cause grave apprehension of her being stove in.  Having done this they rigged the pump, and at it they went with vigour.  All their activity was required, as every wave that broke over her must have penetrated her seams, which were doubtless opened by the buffeting she had received.  But alas! their noble efforts were all in vain, for with a snap, snap, which I could distinctly hear, her cables both broke, and she drifted quickly towards the shore.  Seeing this, and thinking I might possibly be of some service, I ran down to a little wooden shelter I had built at the side of the Cotills, and procured a coil of thin rope, and slinging it over my shoulder I hurried back with it to the scene of what would probably be in a few minutes, a wreck.

When I got back, having only been absent three or four minutes, I saw that the crew had given up all hope of saving their vessel, and were now only intent on saving their lives.  To this end they were getting their only boat out, lowering it safely on the lee side with two of the men and the boy in it; the third man, who appeared to be the skipper, would not leave the vessel, so the boat pushed off, but had not moved ten fathoms away when a tremendous sea curled up under its stern, and turned the boat a complete somersault, shooting the three occupants out into the water.  They could none of them swim apparently, and in a few seconds disappeared beneath the turbulent waves; at least I did not see them again, so that doubtless they found a watery grave.

The last man evidently saw his danger, but was quite calm, although his end seemed near, as only about two hundred yards now intervened between the vessel and the rocky shore.  He proceeded to lash a spar across the two water barrels, which he emptied and bunged up, and then stood ready to jump overboard with them, when the vessel struck.  I also was on the alert with my coil of rope, following the vessel as she drifted slowly along the shore, till she neared a spur of cliff, which runs out near the watch-house, close to the homestead, and here she came in full contact with a mass of rock which shook her, crushed