"O Patient! surely they laid no hands on any of you?" "No, Madam; they left that to the wind and the sea. The three boats cast off, and we prisoners stood alone on the deck of the sinking ship. We had neither wit nor material to make any more boats nor rafts. And when we saw our death thus before us--for our ship, like Paul's, was stuck fast in the forepart, but the sea beat freely on the hinder--we stood like men stupid and amazed for a short season. But then above all the noise of the storm came Mr. Grey's voice, which we were used to obeying, saying, 'Brethren, in a few hours at most, perchance in a few minutes, we shall stand before God. Let our last hour be employed in His worship.' Then we gathered all around him, on that part of the ship which was fast on the rock, and he led the exercise with that Psalm:[2] 'O God, the heathen entered have Thine heritage; by them Defiled is Thine house: on heaps They laid Jerusalem.' "After the Psalm there was an exhortation. Our Minister bade us remember that we were the Lord's freedmen--doubly so now, since our enemies had cast us away from them, and we were left only on the mercy of our God. Moreover, he recalled that of David, saying in his strait, 'Let me fall into the hand of the Lord, for His mercies are great.'[3] Then he prayed with us; and while the exercise yet lasted, and Mr. Grey was still praying, and entreating the Lord to deal with us in his mercy, whether for life or for death,--but if it should be death, as there seemed no other, to grant, if it so pleased Him, an easy dying unto the little children in especial--while he prayed, the ship parted asunder with a great crash, and the waves, leaping up on that part which stuck fast, swept every soul of us out into the boiling sea." "O Patient, what a dreadful story! And how many were saved?" "Four, Madam." "Only four out of thirty-five!" "Ah, Madam! the thirty-one were happier than any of the four!" "Who were saved, Patient?" "Miss Magdalene, and wee Jamie Campbell--old Jamie's grandson--and Roswith, and me.' "And not one of the others?" said Celia, pityingly. "Not one. They were carried by the angels into the rest of the Lord, and He would not grudge them the crown of martyrdom." "And how did you get ashore?"