It must be admitted that the test such feelings were then
subjected to was of the severest, for to their eyes no possible
avenue of escape was open. Along that glaring line of raging,
foaming water not a break occurred, not the faintest indication
of an opening anywhere wherein even so experienced a pilot as
Paddy might thrust a ship. The great black wall of rock loomed
up by their side, grim and pitiless as doom--a very door of
adamant closed against all hope. Nearer and nearer they drew,
until the roar of the baffled Pacific was deafening, maddening,
in its overwhelming volume of chaotic sound. All hands stood
motionless, with eyes fixed in horrible fascination upon the
indescribable vortex to which they were being irresistibly
driven.
At last, just as the fringes of the back-beaten billows hissed up
to greet them, they felt her motion ease. Instinctively looking
aft, they saw the skipper coolly wave his hand, signing to them
to trim the yards. As they hauled on the weather braces, she
plunged through the maelstrom of breakers, and before they had
got the yards right round they were on the other side of that
enormous barrier, the anchor was dropped, and all was still.
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