It was some six weeks after the occurrence of the above event that, while cruising off Cape Gallinas, on the Costa Firme, with our head to the westward, we found ourselves so nearly becalmed that it became necessary for us to set all our flying kites in order to retain steerage-way. The night fell intensely dark, for the moon, well advanced toward her third quarter, rose late, while the sky had gradually become overcast, great masses of heavy cloud having worked up against the wind, threatening one of those violent thunderstorms which are so frequent in this particular part of the world. The storm gathered slowly, and when I put in an appearance on deck to stand my watch, at eight bells of the second dog-watch, it had not yet broken, although an occasional faint flicker of sheet-lightning, away to the eastward, warned us that we might expect it to do so within the next hour or so. At the moment of my appearance on deck, however, there was no very immediate prospect of an outbreak, for the wind although light was steady, and the frigate, close-hauled on the port tack, was creeping along at the rate of about three knots per hour, while the gleams of sheet-lightning were exceedingly faint and infrequent, occurring at about ten-minutes' intervals. Very gradually the brilliancy of the flashes, as well as their frequency and duration, increased, until, by two bells, the glimmer of some of them endured for perhaps as long as three seconds, during which the entire sky, with its enormous, fantastic cloud-shapes, from horizon to zenith, was lit up with a faint sulphurous blue glare, strongly suggestive of the idea that we were afloat in the heart of an enormous cavern, momentarily illuminated by the burning of a port-fire. It was during the flickering of one of these somewhat prolonged gleams that the lookout on the forecastle-head reported: "A small sail, three points on the weather-bow, headin' to the east'ard, close under the land." Mr Galway at once sprang up on the poop, and I followed, both of us intently staring in the direction indicated by the lookout; but the transient gleam had by this time flickered itself out, and we might as well have been staring at a vast curtain of black velvet, for all that we could see. However, by patiently waiting, and persistently staring in the proper direction until the next flash came, we at length contrived to get a momentary glimpse of her, a dozen voices at least exclaiming at the same instant: "There she is!" "Did you see her, Mr Delamere?" demanded the first luff, as the darkness again enwrapped us. "Yes, sir," I answered. "I caught a momentary glimpse of her." "And what did you make her out to be?" he asked.